Wednesday, August 22, 2018

Reading Kant in Tehran, 1979

From:  "Apocalypse"  2013


Kant & Iran, 1979

The two young women
Khadija, Aisha
were in my Kant class
with Dr. Melican, a champion
illuminating hours of fact,
enticing  knowledge
sending sparks igniting  your mind
with fires of wisdom,                        logic
a challenge,                    an engagement
to the marvels of thought

All over Boston
Posters bulleted on walls, streetlights
subway tunnels, on bulletin boards
the face of the Ayatollah
Evangelizing the overthrow of
The CIA-made King

My boss, department chairman, the head
Of the scholastic immigration board
Fighting for the students to go home
Or to stay 
A refuge in the halls of learning
Or fighting in the streets of Tehran


Ibrahim burst into our office
His beard fighting to sprout
and  leak out his ears
words rushing from his mouth
His passion inflammable
His desire to return home
A passionate apostle
To fight for Islam
Evangelically calling divinity
Burning to save a soul


Ibrahim flew East
His  jihad, his sacred Hajj

The two women
entered quietly
with bowed heads, wrapped in brown scarfs
begged to stay, in sorrow, in hope
to home to forever delayed
a family torn apart, with Immanuel standing
calling
Preaching the need
to feed
the mind

21 August 2018


For Arthur J. O’Shea, Ph.D.
Chairman, Dept. of  Psychology, Boston State College
And those two brave women who stayed
Their courage nailed to me
©James M. Frase-White 2018







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