Tile Flower

    Tile flower
    Rain of light
    pouring through the ornaments of the endless cell
    washing a flower on the tile wall.
    The snake of this flower’s stalk
    live in a gentle and smooth dance.
    As if the burning essence of dance
    was dropped down the black snake’s throat.
    Tile flower was alive
    in a world with secrets,
    no ending world of the blue.

    While a child
    In the curve of the terrace ceiling,
    In the colored glass of the windows,
    between the stains on the walls,
    everywhere my eyes wandered for an unknown thing
    alike the tile flower, I saw something
    and every time I went to pick
    my dream shed petals.

    My look on the threads of flower stalk
    I felt the warmth of its veins:
    My whole life had trickled in the throat of the tile flower.
    The flower had another life.
    Is this flower
    that had grown in the soil of my dreams
    knew the past child
    or is that me, who was dripped into it,
    and lost?

    My look on the fragile thread
    It could only hold to its stalk.
    How to pick
    a flower that withers by a dream?
    The hand of my shadow crawled up
    The blue heart of the tiles pounded.
    The rain of light stopped:
    my dream shed petals.

    Sohrab Sepehri (1928 - 1980)
    Translated from Persian by Nasrin Yavari