Statements in Meeting with a Group of Poets and Cultural Figures on the Anniversary of Imam Hassan Mojtaba's Birth

In the Name of God, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful

Our meeting tonight was very pleasant and, God willing, fruitful; first, we heard good poems and became hopeful about the progressive movement of Persian poetry in our country; secondly, poets from various regions of the country were present, diverse and varied, with different tastes, perspectives, and backgrounds, composing poetry. Almost everything that was read was good; all of this is encouraging and hopeful.

Poetry is a national treasure; all types of poetry—ghazal, qasidah, rubaiyat, qit'eh, masnavi, or the so-called old types of poetry or even modern poetry—are all treasures, national treasures; the important thing is how this treasure is intended to be utilized; there has been an effort in the country, and it still exists, to use this treasure in the service of concepts and titles other than what the Revolution provided, presented, and established for us; this effort has existed since the beginning of the Revolution. The reason is that before the Revolution, we had good poets; we had great poets who composed in various types of poetry, in different qualities and levels; however, what was useful for this nation among those poems was not much, it was scarce; whether old poetry—and as the gentlemen say, classical—or modern poetry.

Well, we were in the literary environment of that day, we saw; there were people who composed poetry, who wrote modern poetry, claiming modernism and innovation, but in reality, they did not serve the advancement of the country and the true and correct renewal of the country. Many of those who wrote modern poetry and took pride in it, boasting that they were in the service of new concepts, were actually serving the court and its affiliates and similar entities; [meaning] it cannot be said that they collaborated there; in the true sense of the word, they were serving; well, we knew some of them closely, and some from a distance; we saw their works and recognized them. Poetry was not in the service of the concepts of the Revolution; poetry was not in the service of the concepts of awareness and awakening of the country; not that there was none, but it was scarce, very scarce; compared to what it should have been, it was little; and those things that existed were not such that the general public and the class in need of guidance and leadership could utilize them.

You observe among the modern poets of that day—those at the top and higher—that the one whose poetry was, for example, in the service of such concepts was mostly Akhavan; however, Akhavan's poetry is such that many did not understand anything from it at all; he spoke in such a cryptic and symbolic manner that many did not understand; yes, some who were knowledgeable and familiar with this language understood; others [among the poets] who were not at all in these realms and were not familiar were in the service of other concepts. Classical poets were the same. Of course, there were poets here and there who wrote poetry for religious issues or revolutionary issues, but they were very few; poetry was not in the service of the advancing concepts of the country and the enhancement of the country's insight.

After the Revolution, that trend changed; young people emerged, individuals of determination appeared. These same young people who later, thanks be to God, found higher poetic positions—like the late Hosseini, like the late Ghaisar Aminpour, or Mr. Ali Moallem who [is] not present in our meeting and some others who were the first young people of the Revolution—truly served; that is, they brought the Revolution into a new category. Such individuals truly served; they were a limited number, but day by day this circle expanded. Of course, I sometimes see other poetic works that serve other concepts; now in some, there is enmity towards Islamic and revolutionary concepts, and in some, there is no enmity—sometimes they come and bring us poems, I look and see—but today, at the general level of the country, the predominance is with poetry that is aligned with the Revolution; now whether it is religious concepts or revolutionary concepts or concepts related to the Sacred Defense and issues of this kind; various types of poetry. Today, this treasure, fortunately, is being utilized in this direction.

Until a few years ago, there was poetic material, [but] the poetic rank was low, it was not high; fortunately, the poetic rank has progressed, it has risen; one can observe this from the poems that are recited. Well, sometimes in the early days, in this same mid-Ramadan meeting—which has been held for several years now, perhaps thirty years or more or less—I would listen, but I was truly frustrated by the poetry that was recited; because I saw that the level of the poems was not appropriate and desirable. Now, not so! Truly, each of these friends who recite poetry makes one feel proud, one feels that thanks be to God, work is progressing; that is, poetry—this very material that is growing and flourishing and progressing—continues to blossom and advance; poetry is like this, that is, art is like this; many truths are like this that gradually, if worked on within the country, are like this; like a tree that day by day its growth increases, if it is tended to, cared for, watered, pruned, and so on, it grows day by day, and its benefits and fruit-bearing increase. This state now exists in the poetry of the country, fortunately. Therefore, these two characteristics exist; both poetry—this immense human treasure—relatively to other sections, is good in the service of good concepts; and this [poetry] that is in the service of these concepts has a high level, a good level, and is on the rise and moving forward; these two points exist.

However, I want to say that in these areas, stagnation and the feeling of having arrived is a deadly poison; each of you gentlemen, those whose poetry is very good and one enjoys it, if they feel that they have reached the final station and there is nothing beyond, they will certainly stagnate and decline. Besides, this [feeling] is also erroneous; that is, now in this present gathering, let’s assume we have screened and one has become the first rank; the one who is among the present gathering in the first rank is not in the first rank in the world of poetry; that is, after all, the distance between him and Saadi, Hafez, Ferdowsi, and Jamii is a considerable distance, and he must reach them; [of course] one can go even higher than them; it is not that Hafez is the ultimate limit of poetry; no, one can go higher; both in the use of expressions and the range of appropriate vocabulary in poetry, and in theme-finding; theme-finding like what one sees, for example, in the poetry of Saeb, in the poetry of Kalim, in the poetry of Hazin, and most of all in the poetry of Bidel. After all, a lot of work needs to be done in these areas, and it can be done, and this tree has the ability and capacity for growth much more than this.

So, we want to say that friends who, thanks be to God, are at a level that their poetry evokes admiration, should not think that "well, we have arrived, thanks be to God, it is finished"; no, they must still strive, they must work, they must move forward. We still know in the world of poetry, from the period before the current period, individuals who, in terms of poetic material, had a noticeably higher level than today’s good poets; that is, there were truly individuals who, for example, in ghazal, had a truly higher level. Now, we are not talking about content; the contents may not be acceptable to us, but in terms of the form of ghazal [they had a higher level]; consider Amir Firuzkuhi or Rahy Ma'iyari or until recently, the late Ghahreman or Qodsiy or some others; these had a high poetic level, and one cannot overlook them. In modern poetry, it is the same; in modern poetry, there were indeed distinguished and outstanding individuals; now those whom we knew and I knew, like the late Akhavan and others like him. In any case, one must move forward, and stagnation is not permissible. This is one point.

Pay attention to poetry as much as you can, both for its theme-finding, for refining its words, and for drawing more towards the concepts needed today; find these concepts. Honestly, we Iranians are lazy in reporting the truths and events and personalities of our own; it is truly like this. Now, of course, this is worthy of research by sociologists to investigate whether this laziness is a national characteristic of ours or has been imposed on us over time? We do not work on our personalities. Now, for example, consider our great Imam; he is a first-rate personality; that is, no one—whether friend or enemy—has any doubt about the personality of the Imam and no one doubts the greatness of this personality. One may not accept him, but he acknowledges his greatness. Now, how many volumes of books have we written about this great personality who was in our time and nearly thirty years have passed since his passing? Really think about how many books we have written about the Imam! Compare this with the number of books that have been written about Abraham Lincoln in America. I read in a report that [if] the number of books written for Abraham Lincoln were stacked together, it would create a ten-meter column; something like this. Now, Abraham Lincoln has a title—although my belief is that this title is false; the claim that he [was the one who] freed the slaves and so on is nonsense, it is not a real statement; [but] now it is titled this way—but regarding ordinary American presidents like Eisenhower, like others, sometimes a thousand volumes of books have been written! Is this a joke? You see how many volumes of books we have written about Imam Khomeini? This is the situation; we are behind in these areas; [of course] we Iranians are behind, but in Arab countries, I have seen that regarding events that occur, immediately books are written; immediately political analyses, and such books are written; from various dimensions, from different aspects, various tastes, supporters, opponents, they analyze and so on; we are truly behind in these areas. The same goes for poetry.

Now, consider that the issues of Syria, the issues of the defenders of the shrine, well, there is room for hundreds of poems to be written about this. Or consider the issues of Iraq; the issues of Iraq are very important; of course, one might somewhat be able to excuse the people, [because] most of our people are unaware of the truth of the Iraq issue and what happened in Iraq—the work that the Americans wanted to do in Iraq and how they hit a wall and what factors led to this situation—naturally, they are unaware, but really, it is a strange issue that the country of Iraq under Saddam Hussein becomes the country of Iraq of martyr Hakim! Just consider how great this distance is? It is unimaginable; this has happened. Well, hundreds, perhaps thousands of poems should be written about this, an epic should be composed.

Today, one of the gentlemen had composed an epic, they brought it to me, I looked at it; now I do not remember what the epic was, [it seemed to me] it was a four-part poem; it was an epic. One of the works we have not done is epic-making. Consider a subject, create an epic for it; just as our past poets did this. One of the interesting works of the late Amir Firuzkuhi was epic-making. He had three types of poetry, three styles, three genres: he had ghazal, [this] was one style, the beautiful Indian style of ghazal, for example, full of meaning; then he had qasidah in the style of Khaqani—one who looks at the qasidah of Amir Firuzkuhi might sometimes confuse it with Khaqani; truly in the style of Khaqani's qasidas—and he had an epic outside of both of these styles; new styles. Consider a tree in Simin Dasht—where he had a property in the north, for example, there was a tree there—he had composed an epic about it; that is, such works existed in the past. Or the late Mr. Elahi Qomeshai, his Naghmeh-ye Hosseini is an epic, he composed the Naghmeh-ye Hosseini for his son Hossein Agha—who is now prominent. The late Mr. Elahi personally told me this story that this child was ill and he had lost hope that this child, who was an infant, would survive; he vowed that if this child survived, he would compose an epic about Imam Hossein. He said I started thinking, I saw my child was dying, the child was in those last hours and was dying; so that the mother would not see the child dying, I told her to go up on the roof; I said go up on the roof, uncover your head, pray, do this; under this pretext, I wanted to distance her from the child so she would not see the child dying, but this vow came to my mind that if this child survives, I would compose an epic about Imam Hossein; then I started thinking about where to start, how to say it, and so on, and gradually in my mind [I was saying] that suddenly I reached Ali Asghar and the thirst of Ali Asghar; suddenly it came to my mind that this child has not drunk water or milk for three or four days on the doctor's orders; the doctor had said that water and milk would harm this [child], if he drinks, he will die; I said to myself this child is thirsty, that he is dying, let me give him water [then] he dies; now that he is dying, at least he will not die thirsty; he said I got up, brought water, and with a teaspoon, I gradually poured water between the lips of this child; after doing this two or three times, I saw his eyes opened; I gave him more water, he started crying; I went to the foot of the stairs, called his mother and said come, your child wants milk; the mother thought the child was dead, I was saying with this tongue that "come, your child wants milk"; she came down and saw no, the child is crying and wants milk, she began to breastfeed; he said the child got better! Of course, he mentioned this story in the introduction of Naghmeh-ye Hosseini; what he told me and what I have now narrated differs slightly from what is in the introduction of Naghmeh-ye Hosseini:

In [the page of] the notebook, name and sign The name of Hussein came to him from the sky.

This Elahi Qomeshai who performs the program is this; this child belongs to this [story]. The point is, well, he composed the Naghmeh-ye Hosseini, and one of the best poems of Mr. Elahi Qomeshai is this Naghmeh-ye Hosseini; that is, among the best poems of Mr. Elahi, this epic Naghmeh-ye Hosseini is. Well, we do not have epics.

One of the friends reminded me that among the things we do not have—so to speak—the genre of satire is missing; now these foreign words have become so prevalent that without them, it seems one does not understand; the genre of satire. The Prophet said to Hassan ibn Thabit to satirize them; he began to satirize. [You too] satirize; well, he dances with a sword! This modern ignorance has placed itself alongside tribal ignorance! Nothing is more beautiful than this scene! Satirize this in poetry. Thousands of poems can be written about this, for example, consider. Now satire is one issue, humor is another issue, which fortunately exists, and tonight both the gentleman read, and Mr. Nasser Feiz was there who did not read, and others, thanks be to God, in terms of humor, it is not bad; gradually we have made progress; however, satire is missing; these things that sometimes they do should be satirized. That they come and, for example, consider a country like Saudi Arabia to be [the] human rights commission of the United Nations! Nothing is more interesting than this! Truly, it deserves satire; it is a pity that it is not satirized; if such a thing is not satirized, it is a pity, it is lost. This is also the case. God willing, may God grant you all success; it is already 12 o'clock, goodbye.