When My Mother Was Writing Poetry
“She Would Take Flight & Would be Free of this World”
By JAHANSHAH AFSHAR
I was born in Tehran, and have been living in Phoenix, Arizona, with my wife and our children. We have two sons; James Eskandar, whom I have named after my father, and Shaun, the youngest.
I don’t remember much of my childhood. I know all was okay and at the same time, not so okay. We travelled from Iran to England, and finally to America. The haziest image of my life is of my mother. She was always sick as far back as I can remember. All my memories of her are related to her illness; either in the hospital, or in bed at home.
The passion of her life was poetry. Poetry and music would make her happy, and as the illness intensified, her only piece of mind was to lose herself in her craft. I was seven or eight years old when I found out about her cancer. I think of that moment like the very first memories of my life. It seems to me that I do not remember anything before that. I think it was around 1978/1979 when I realized she was a poet, and that’s when we were living in London. Then slowly I got to know more about what she did and loved to do till the last moment of her life. She always had company, and she would read her poems for others all the time. Many singers were among her friends and acquaintances. They would come and go would sing her poems. She would ride with me in my car, and she would write, while I drove. I felt like she takes flight when she wrote a poem and would become free of this world. I was always very close to my mother. My teen years and youth were full of ups and downs.
I remember one day in London, I was playing basketball with Alidad. Pasha was standing there watching us. Suddenly my mom showed up, took the ball away from us and started playing with us with such athleticism that shocked us all.
The long hours that she spent with musicians and singers to arrange her songs, on the one hand, and her illness on the other, caused problems between our mother and father. Her illness caused anxiety, emotional stress, and mental pressure on both of them.
I have always had a good relationship with my brothers. There are so many common characteristics and attachments Pasha and I. I am very close to Alidad also and we speak all the time. Unfortunately, I live far away from them both and can’t meet up with them as often as we all would like.
My mother was not always a happy woman, but she had a great sense of humor. Her passion and energy would carry on to others around her and make them happy. She was in love with life. Cancer made her sad, and subsequently, anxiety would replace her joy. As far as I can remember she battled with cancer for 13 years, which finally took her away from us.
After her death, our world was in disarray, and it felt like we had all lost our minds. My father returned to Iran and made it his home. My brothers and I were left alone and had to grow up fast. We tried to live our lives the best we could and we pushed each other forward. We grew up on a daily basis, without anybody around us to show us how to deal with everything. We didn’t know what to do and how to survive. Somehow, however, life went on, while it felt like we had actually lost both of our parents. But I know that my mother’s presence will never leave us.
