Hopes and the cruel hand of darkness: An introduction to Laila Sarahat Rushani's poem "Desire" (تمنا)
Hopes and the cruel hand of darkness: An introduction to Laila Sarahat Rushani's poem "Desire" (تمنا)
Laila Sarahat Rushani (1958-2004) wrote "Desire" (تمنا) in 1979, at age 21, during her final years of Farsi literature studies at Kabul University. This was a century past the start of Amir Abdur Rahman's reign of terror. Yet, it marked the second year of nearly a half-century of modern turmoil that would eventually grip Kabulistan and its surrounding regions. This devastation, born of political zealotry, was imposed by the "hand of darkness" (دست سیاهی).
The personal tragedy grounding this poem is profound: Her father, Sarshar Rushani, was tortured and murdered during the Khalq regime's reign of terror (1978–79) simply because he, like many others, refused allegiance to the tyrannical one-party political system.
The poem itself begins with a metered four-line stanza, transitioning immediately into the free-form style (She'r-e Now). The opening lines cry out to the first light of dawn (سپیده) for release from the "hand of darkness." This hand of cruelty is a central, recurring metaphor in her work, illustrating the wave-upon-wave of oppression imposed on her people—women, men, and children.
Her poem "Inmate" (زندانی) vividly captures this dilemma: She describes a bird (a symbol of freedom) "restlessly searching for an aperture, perhaps towards the path of freedom!" (!بی تابانه روزنی می جوید شاید سوی آزادی). The task is difficult, leaving the winged creator of freedom in complete darkness, searching for a single pinprick of light.
In her unpublished poem "Tragedy" (فاجعه), Rushani tells of that very hand again: "A bouquet of dreams and hope rested in my hands, My eyes, complete with the vision of spring, A hand broke my stem of dreams, A hand clasped my wings of hope" (دستم پر از شگوفه رويا بود چشمم پر از نگاه بهارانه, دستی شکست قامت رويايم, دست ببست بال تمنايم). She concludes, "I remained scattered in this ongoing catastrophe" (من دربسيط فاجعه گم شدم).
The word "Desire" (تمنا) carries a hint of romantic air. The final lines reveal its core, tragic theme: a plea for intimacy, a light that embodies liberty; "For our hands, the zenith is pure intimacy, You take my hand and mold my being" (چو دستان ما اوج پیوستن است / تو دستم بگیر و بنایم نما). However, that love—that light—is immediately denied. Silence replaces joyful sounds, and openness yields to a prison of darkness, where truth is mirrored back as falsehood.
The more I read this poem, the more I sense the everlasting theme in much of her work: the yearning for what cannot be attained, as the hand of brutality repeatedly shrouds all it can reach in pitch darkness. As the contemporary poet Shukrea Erfani voiced, "Poetry and art are inherently a cry against darkness and light that keeps the human heart bright, and this issue is always more significant and beyond the limits of time and place."
Rushani and her contemporary poets should be translated, studied, and discussed. Their attempt to voice the voiceless, pursuing the truth of humanity and the need for self-determination, holds a vital place in understanding the context of their time and of our own.
Fall 2025 | پاییز ۱۴۰۴
