Don’t Tell Mom
Ari Honarvar
Tell Mom of splashes of nasturtium on the green canvas of the lawn
Of narcissus flowers playing hide and seek with butterflies
Of girls, their hair dancing in the wind
and music of joy whirling in the alleys
Tell her of the God of rainbows
and young inventors growing old
The courage
of Woman Life Freedom
But dad,
don’t tell her about the swinging noose searching for a neck
And what happens tomorrow at dawn
Please don’t tell mom
Poet’s note
The poem above is in response to a young Iranian protester's phone call to his father from prison.
'Dad, they have reached a verdict. Mine is execution by hanging. Don't tell mom,' Whispered the 22-year-old Mohammad Mehdi Karami into the phone after the judge reached a verdict in a sham trial. A few weeks later he was executed. There are thousands of political prisoners languishing in Iran. The Islamic Republic is now executing one prisoner every 6 hours.
Of narcissus flowers playing hide and seek with butterflies
Of girls, their hair dancing in the wind
and music of joy whirling in the alleys
Tell her of the God of rainbows
and young inventors growing old
The courage
of Woman Life Freedom
But dad,
don’t tell her about the swinging noose searching for a neck
And what happens tomorrow at dawn
Please don’t tell mom
Poet’s note
The poem above is in response to a young Iranian protester's phone call to his father from prison.
'Dad, they have reached a verdict. Mine is execution by hanging. Don't tell mom,' Whispered the 22-year-old Mohammad Mehdi Karami into the phone after the judge reached a verdict in a sham trial. A few weeks later he was executed. There are thousands of political prisoners languishing in Iran. The Islamic Republic is now executing one prisoner every 6 hours.
Ari Honarvar is the founder of Rumi with a View, dedicated to building bridges between the arts, social justice, and well-being. She dances with refugees and conducts Resilience through Joy workshops on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border. Her words have been featured in The Guardian, The Washington Post, The New York Times, and elsewhere. She is the author of the critically acclaimed novel A Girl Called Rumi and the creator of Rumi’s Gift Oracle Deck.
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