Simin Behbahani's dobāré meesāzamat vatan

dorood bé hamegee- hello and welcome to part 3 of our lesson series on Simin Behbahani’s powerful poem dobāre meesāzamat vatan. Just as we do in each of these lessons, let’s start out by listening to my khālé Farnaz reading the part of the poem that we learned in the last lesson, and then moving on to the part we’ll be learning this lesson.

As you’re listening, I want you to pay special attention to the lines that were in the last lesson. See how they sound to you this time around- are you able to understand them now? Does that portion of the poem mean something different to you now that you’ve been mulling over these words and phrases a bit more? And how about the new section- any familiar words you’re able to pick out? And how excited are you for those words and phrases in the second part to go from being strangers to becoming familiar? As I go through these poems on these lessons, that’s how I feel- I go from being a passive recipient of the words to becoming an active participant.

Test

All right, let’s listen to the recitation:

dobāré meesāzamat vatan

دوباره می‌سازمت وطن!

Once again I will build you, O homeland,

agar ché bā kheshté jāné kheesh

اگر چه با خِشت جان خویش

Even if with the bricks of my very own being

sotoon bé saghfé tō meezanam

ستون به سقف تو می‌زنم،

I’ll raise columns to your roof

agar ché bā ostokhāné kheesh

اگر چه با استخوان خویش

Even if it be with my very own bones

dobāré meebooyam az tō gol

دوباره می‌بویم از تو گُل،

Once again I will smell your flowers

bé maylé naslé javāné tō

به میل نسل جوان تو

Through the endeavor of your generation of youth

dobāré meeshooyam az tō khoon

دوباره می‌شویم از تو خون،

Once again I’ll wash away blood from you

bé saylé ashké ravāné kheesh

به سیل اشک روان خویش

Through the flood of my flowing tears

dobāré, yek roozé āshenā

دوباره، یک روز آشنا،

Once again, one familiar day

seeyāhee az khāné meeravad

سیاهی از خانه می‌رود

Darkness will leave home

bé she'ré khod rang meezanam

به شعر خود رنگ می‌زنم،

I will color my own poetry

zé ābeeyé āsemāné kheesh

ز آبیِ آسمان خویش

With the blue of your own sky

Ok, so let’s start with that first line in the second part:

dobāré meeshooyam az tō khoon

So dobāré we’ve heard many times before- it means again. dobāré

(dobāré)

and the word meeshooyam- again same construction as we heard last week. It starts with mee letting us know it’s in the present tense, and ends with am letting us know it’s in the first person. so meeshooyam- I will wash. meeshooyam

(meeshooyam)

dobāré meeshooyam az tō khoon. So az means from. az

(az)

and tō means you informal as we learned last week. tō

(tō)

and khoon is the word for blood, khoon

(khoon)

dobāré meeshooyam az tō khoon, and this all together means I will again wash away from you blood. dobāré meeshooyam

(dobāré meeshooyam)

(az tō khoon)

(az tō khoon)

and next line: bé saylé ashké ravāné kheesh. So sayl is the word for flood. sayl

(sayl)

and bé is the word for to. bé

(bé)

so bé saylé ashké ravāné kheesh. You hear that é sound in there after each adjective and it tells you that those are all being connected together- that each word in there is describing the next word. Let’s start with the last word- kheesh

(kheesh)

again it means myself. kheesh

(kheesh)

ravān is the word for flowing. ravān

and ashk is the word for tear. ashk

(ashk)

so bé saylé ashké ravāné kheesh means to the flood of the flowing tears of my self. Or as Sahba translated it Through the flood of my flowing tears. bé saylé

(bé saylé)

(ashké ravāné)

(ashké ravāné)

(kheesh)

(kheesh)

Ok wonderful. Let’s hear Farnaz recite these first two lines, and then the next two lines we’ll be learning:

dobāré meeshooyam az tō khoon

دوباره می‌شویم از تو خون،

Once again I’ll wash away blood from you

bé saylé ashké ravāné kheesh

به سیل اشک روان خویش

Through the flood of my flowing tears

dobāré, yek roozé āshenā

دوباره، یک روز آشنا،

Once again, one familiar day

seeyāhee az khāné meeravad

سیاهی از خانه می‌رود

Darkness will leave home

Ok beautiful. These words are so simple, and it really is a treat to learn a modern poem because these are the words that we use in everyday speaking. So dobāré, again. dobāré

(dobāré)

and then yek roozé āshenā. So the word āshenā means familiar. āshenā

(āshenā)

And familiar in the very intimate sense- so I know you- āshenā

(āshenā)

In fact, this word can be used to talk about someone you know. A person you know is called an āshenā

(āshenā)

but here he’s saying yek roozé āshenā. yek is the word for one. yek

(yek)

and rooz is the word for day. rooz

(rooz)

so roozé āshenā means a familiar day. roozé āshenā

(roozé āshenā)

so yek roozé āshenā means one familiar day. yek roozé āshenā

(yek roozé āshenā)

so dobāré yek roozé āshenā, again one familiar day

(dobāré)

(dobāré)

(yek roozé āshenā)

(yek roozé āshenā)

Great! Now let’s listen to all six lines, which includes the last two we’ll be learning.

dobāré meeshooyam az tō khoon

دوباره می‌شویم از تو خون،

Once again I’ll wash away blood from you

bé saylé ashké ravāné kheesh

به سیل اشک روان خویش

Through the flood of my flowing tears

dobāré, yek roozé āshenā

دوباره، یک روز آشنا،

Once again, one familiar day

seeyāhee az khāné meeravad

سیاهی از خانه می‌رود

Darkness will leave home

bé she'ré khod rang meezanam

به شعر خود رنگ می‌زنم،

I will color my own poetry

zé ābeeyé āsemāné kheesh

ز آبیِ آسمان خویش

With the blue of your own sky

Ok finally- bé she'ré khod rang meezanam. So again, the word bé mean to. bé

(bé)

and she'r is the word for poem. she'r

(she'r)

and khod finally means self. khod

(khod)

So same meaning as the word kheesh. khod

(khod)

so bé she'ré khod means to my own poem. bé she'ré khod

and then rang meezanam. so rang zadan is part of those compound verbs that Persian has, where it’s literal to hit a color- rang zadan

(rang zadan)

but it means to color. and rang meezanam means I will color. rang meezanam

(rang meezanam)

so bé she'ré khod rang meezanam means to my own poem I will color. In other words, I will color my own poetry. bé she'ré khod

(bé she'ré khod)

(rang meezanam)

(rang meezanam)

and finally zé ābeeyé āsemāné kheesh

So in a lot of poetry, when you hear zé it’s another way of saying az. zé

(zé)

and az means from. zé

(zé)

and ābeeyé āsemāné kheesh

So we have the word kheesh which we know means self. kheesh

(kheesh)

and in this case, it’s referring to your self. kheesh

(kheesh)

and ābee is the word for blue. ābee

(ābee)

one beautiful thing about colors in the Persian language is that they’re often associated with the thing we most associate with that color. So in the case of ābee, the word for water is āb

(āb)

and ābee means blue. ābee

(ābee)

and finally āsemān means sky. āsemān

so ābeeyé āsemāné kheesh means the blue of the sky of your self. ābeeyé āsemāné kheesh

(ābeeyé āsemāné kheesh)

ok wonderful! So zé ābeeyé āsemāné kheesh, means from the blue of the sky of your self.

So these two together,

bé she'ré khod rang meezanam

به شعر خود رنگ می‌زنم،

I will color my own poetry

zé ābeeyé āsemāné kheesh

ز آبیِ آسمان خویش

With the blue of your own sky

Means I will color my own poetry with the blue of you own sky- bé she'ré khod rang meezanam- I will color my own poetry, zé ābeeyé āsemāné kheesh, with the blue of your own sky.

Let’s repeat this last line bit by bit together-

(zé ābeeyé)

(zé ābeeyé)

(āsemāné kheesh)

(āsemāné kheesh)

Ok wonderful!! Now let’s listen to the entire poem to where we’ve learned this week, starting with last week’s lines, and ending with this week’s lines:

dobāré meesāzamat vatan

دوباره می‌سازمت وطن!

Once again I will build you, O homeland,

agar ché bā kheshté jāné kheesh

اگر چه با خِشت جان خویش

Even if with the bricks of my very own being

sotoon bé saghfé tō meezanam

ستون به سقف تو می‌زنم،

I’ll raise columns to your roof

agar ché bā ostokhāné kheesh

اگر چه با استخوان خویش

Even if it be with my very own bones

dobāré meebooyam az tō gol

دوباره می‌بویم از تو گُل،

Once again I will smell your flowers

bé maylé naslé javāné tō

به میل نسل جوان تو

Through the endeavor of your generation of youth

dobāré meeshooyam az tō khoon

دوباره می‌شویم از تو خون،

Once again I’ll wash away blood from you

bé saylé ashké ravāné kheesh

به سیل اشک روان خویش

Through the flood of my flowing tears

dobāré, yek roozé āshenā

دوباره، یک روز آشنا،

Once again, one familiar day

seeyāhee az khāné meeravad

سیاهی از خانه می‌رود

Darkness will leave home

bé she'ré khod rang meezanam

به شعر خود رنگ می‌زنم،

I will color my own poetry

zé ābeeyé āsemāné kheesh

ز آبیِ آسمان خویش

With the blue of your own sky

Wonderful! And now hopefully you understood those last 6 lines along with the ones from last week.

So again, practice these lines this week- take a look at the pdf guide, listen to the lines individually as read by Farnaz on our website.

And we’ll be back next week with another short and sweet lesson about Simin Behbahani’s beautiful poem, dobāré meesāzamat vatan

Thank you so much for listening, and until next time,

khodāhāfez,

from leyla