Marzieh Ghiasi

Source: William Blake’s illustrations for John Milton’s Paradise Lost (1808).

“Apples Snakes Skies & Fires”

Apples, snakes, skies and fires
Tomorrow will bring us desires
Yesterday’s empires
Came and went with dust.

Vivid dreams, acid streams
Talking faces, without basis
Purposeless, senselessness
Bloodshed, alive.

Can you feel it beating?
Can you hear them screaming?
Voices, voices
To the sound of your heart.

Apples, snakes, skies and fires
Tomorrow will bring us desires
Yesterday’s empires
Came and went with dust.

In Sappho‘s arms, a poet’s embrace
Lawlessness, an enslaved race
Marching now, to the drums
Consequences lost in bombs.

Apples, snakes, skies and fires
Tomorrow will bring us desires
Yesterday’s empires
Came and went with dust.

Paradise lost, Eden found
But I chose to turn around
You may never forgive me
I’m at last free.

Notes: Above are spur-of-the-moment lyrics I wrote a couple of years ago and recently recovered. I’m by no means a poet or a lyricist, but this was one of those rare occasions where I was able to perfectly encapsulate and convey my internal state into very few words.

The piece initially had an introductory section which made reference to Matthew Arnold‘s Dover Beach, specifically the lines “Sophocles long ago/Heard it on the Agaean, and it brought/Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow/Of human misery” from which the refrain is inspired. In my piece, I observe the fluctuating and transient nature of human experience, but assert that a constant element exists that marks these experiences: desire.

This element encompasses the destructive temptation that is called the root of all evil in Judeo-Christian traditions, and the destructive craving that is considered the origin of suffering in Buddhist and Hindu traditions. However, the same desire is also the single purveyor of our civilization, always pushing us to reach out further, to become more, and to create. In order to highlight the dual and paradoxical nature of desire, I juxtapose images of good and evil, creation and destruction, and antiquity with modernity throughout the piece.

To make note of an obvious reference– a tribute is paid to Sappho, whose poetry has been called “the only feminine voice, the only vision of a woman thrown into the ancient world that we know only through men.” The specific phrase ‘in Sappho’s arms’ was written by Elijah Fenton in his early 1700s book retelling Greek mythology. The line refers to the myth of Phaon and Sappho, a tragedy about persistent desire: “And, from his crime absolv’d, with all his charms /He long shall live, and die in Sappho’s arms.”

Lastly (this is way longer than I intended it to be!), I wanted to give this composition an ambiguous feeling and leave it open to interpretation. In the final stanza, for instance, Eden could be seen in the traditional Abrahamic tradition, or in itself viewed itself as an object of humankind’s longing. What is read ultimately varies depending on one’s perspective, and whether one associates a resigned, redemptive or another tone with the composition.

Inside the Citadel of Karim Khan/Arg-e-Karim Khan. The paintings were plastered in the Qajar era when it was converted into a prison, now being restored.

You must have a room, or certain hour or so a day, where you don’t know what was in the newspapers that morning, you don’t know who your friends are, you don’t know what you owe anybody, you don’t know what anybody owes to you. This is a place where you can simply experience and bring forth what you are and what you might be. This is the place of creative incubation. At first you may find that nothing happens there. But if you have a sacred place and use it, something eventually will happen.

-Joseph Campbell (mythologist, writer)

Today is international Towel Day, a day of tribute to the late Douglas Adams, the brilliant author of, among many works, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (1979). Despite passing away quite young, Douglas Adams has had an undeniable influence on popular culture. When I first read Hitchhiker’s Guide in my late teens, I felt as though I had finally been let in on a big universal joke. The sci-fi genre was one I was well-acquainted with, but this was something entirely different– it was the seriously funniest or the funniest serious work I’d ever read. I finished the rest of the series within the span of a few weeks that summer and keep going back to them to this very day for wisdom and insight that just can’t be found elsewhere.

A towel, it says, is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have. Partly it has great practical value. You can wrap it around you for warmth as you bound across the cold moons of Jaglan Beta; you can lie on it on the brilliant marble-sanded beaches of Santraginus V, inhaling the heady sea vapors; you can sleep under it beneath the stars which shine so redly on the desert world of Kakrafoon; use it to sail a miniraft down the slow heavy River Moth; wet it for use in hand-to-hand-combat; wrap it round your head to ward off noxious fumes or avoid the gaze of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal (such a mind-bogglingly stupid animal, it assumes that if you can’t see it, it can’t see you); you can wave your towel in emergencies as a distress signal, and of course dry yourself off with it if it still seems to be clean enough.

More importantly, a towel has immense psychological value. For some reason, if a strag (strag: non-hitch hiker) discovers that a hitch hiker has his towel with him, he will automatically assume that he is also in possession of a toothbrush, face flannel, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, ball of string, gnat spray, wet weather gear, space suit etc., etc. Furthermore, the strag will then happily lend the hitch hiker any of these or a dozen other items that the hitch hiker might accidentally have “lost”. What the strag will think is that any man who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against terrible odds, win through, and still knows where his towel is is clearly a man to be reckoned with.

-Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Chapt. 3)

While Douglas Adams was indeed onto something, if I were to travel across time and space carrying only a towel, I’d only be comfortable with one which had the following printed on it:

*Source: Topotaco via Gizmodo

To Mr. Adams, faeries or not, I’d like to think you are enjoying the view of the garden from the restaurant.

Leonardo Da Vinci once said “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” and nowhere does this hold more true than in writing. The best written works aren’t those that are the longest or use the biggest words– writing a work that is concise, lucid and fluent requires much more skill and dedication, and achieving that balance is something that I’ve struggled with in my writing. The following is a brilliant essay by English author and journalist George Orwell, expanding on the mantra “Keep it simple, stupid!“. While the essay is targeted to political writing, the principles laid out are important for any writer (to have hammered in his/her brain).

Politics and the English Language

George Orwell (1946)

Most people who bother with the matter at all would admit that the English language is in a bad way, but it is generally assumed that we cannot by conscious action do anything about it. Our civilization is decadent, and our language—so the argument runs—must inevitably share in the general collapse. It follows that any struggle against the abuse of language is a sentimental archaism, like preferring candles to electric light or hansom cabs to aeroplanes. Underneath this lies the half-conscious belief that language is a natural growth and not an instrument which we shape for our own purposes.

Now, it is clear that the decline of a language must ultimately have political and economic causes: it is not due simply to the bad influence of this or that individual writer. But an effect can become a cause, reinforcing the original cause and producing the same effect in an intensified form, and so on indefinitely. A man may take to drink because he feels himself to be a failure, and then fail all the more completely because he drinks. It is rather the same thing that is happening to the English language. It becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts. The point is that the process is reversible.

Modern English, especially written English, is full of bad habits which spread by imitation and which can be avoided if one is willing to take the necessary trouble. If one gets rid of these habits one can think more clearly, and to think clearly is a necessary first step towards political regeneration: so that the fight against bad English is not frivolous and is not the exclusive concern of professional writers. I will come back to this presently, and I hope that by that time the meaning of what I have said here will have become clearer. Meanwhile, here are five specimens of the English language as it is now habitually written.
Read the rest of this entry »

« Back to part 1 | Speaking of revolutionary thinking, today, April 25^th is also the anniversary of Portugal’s 1974 Carnation Revolution, which took place five years before the Iranian Revolution in 1979. The Carnation Revolution was a single day culmination of a long struggle, but was notable in that in its last stages the revolutionary soldiers and people did not use direct violence, but came together peacefully to overthrow and transform the Portuguese government from a dictatorship to a relatively successful democracy. It has been said that “the population, holding red carnations, convinced the regime soldiers not to resist. The soldiers readily swapped their bullets for flowers.”

Image source.

I’d like to read about Portuguese history and the coming of the Carnation Revolution this summer, but as it is said a picture can speak a thousand words– and some pictures of the carnations in the gun barrels in various blogs today remind me not of pages from a history book, but the people I saw last summer in the streets of Tehran. In particular, they reminded me images I witnessed with my own eyes and recorded on July 17^th, 2009. Here’s a brief excerpt from my notes:

The past few days people across the country have been anticipating the Friday prayers this week. One of the former presidents, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani is scheduled to give the Friday sermon. [...] Some commentators have been calling it a potential turning point, «روز مبادا», while others are more hesitant. We’ll see, I suppose. [...] Passing through Northern Tehran, I’ve seen so many who have donned black chadors, which is a rather peculiar sight here. But people are waiting for buses, I guess everyone is going to the same place. [...] The streets are packed with cars starting near Tarbiat Modares University, in fact I am guessing the 3-5km radius around Enghelab square is fully packed [...] Passing through Dr. Fatemi street, the concentration of police has increased significantly [...]

[...] A police-man just seriously beat some poor guy, likely a storekeeper, sitting on the steps of his store to watch the people passing by. Horrifying. [...] I just saw a young soldier in a green uniform walking in the grassy area in middle of the avenue, against the current of people, with a carnation in his hand. He was holding it was as if it was a fragile thing, looking at it, dazed, smiling. I wonder who gave it to him.
Perhaps there is hope yet.

April 25^th is a rather interesting and historically eventful day. Today is DNA Day, commemorating the 1953 publication of James D. Watson and Francis Crick’s article elucidating the structure of DNA. Today is also the 7th anniversary of the completion of the ambitious Human Genome Project, which while in itself a monumental accomplishment, will be instrumental to the next great leap in the biological sciences.

Global malaria endemicity via Global Malaria Partnership.

World Malaria Day, takes place today in recognition of malaria, a preventable infection that is endemic to 109 countries, leading to as many as 250 million infections each year and one million deaths each year. As with the Neglected Tropical Diseases, which also put two billion at risk, those who are most likely to die from malaria are already the most vulnerable in world, their condition exacerbated by the social and economic burden of these diseases. As I posted in @ntds earlier today “No man is an island… we global advocates must work together to eradicate HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, Malaria, and Neglected Tropical Diseases.” I am an advocate of the vast yet concentrated efforts used to eradicate smallpox, but at the same time, I believe that today, given the knowledge and tools available, we are capable of a much more contextualized response. In my view, given the interplay between these four diseases, tackling one without a comprehensive and coordinated strategy to tackle the others is akin to containing a leaking dam with a finger. It’s not going to be effective over the long term.

I love examining how great transformations occur, and I think in order to eradicate the the ‘Big Four’ infectious diseases that scourge our world, we need a great transformation in how we approach these infections, integrated strategies (as advocated by GNNTD) and revolutionary thinking.

Continue to part 2 »

Finals are finally drawing to a close, and I absolutely can’t hide my excitement and relief. Although I don’t have any interesting plans for this summer, at least nothing as interesting previous one, the summer will afford me more time for some serious reading and writing. And movie marathons. Can’t forget that.

In the meantime I need to curb my enthusiasm…but happy belated Earth Day. The Big Picture had some pretty incredible pictures up in celebration of Earth Day on April 22^nd. I look at some of these pictures and can’t even comprehend how such beauty is possible. To imagine billions and billions of heart beating to pulsating rivers… it will never be overrated to say our Earth is truly incredible.

A poison dart frog of the dendrobates genus clings to a leaf at the Botanic Gardens in Medellin April 22, 2010. (REUTERS/Fredy Builes)

Reposted from my new scrapbook Pārsa:

All roads lead to Persepolis.

Via National Geographic (Photo by James Blair)

The animation above is based on illustrations from the Flight of the Hummingbird by Haida Canadian artist Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas. The story, which is from the parables of the Quechuan people of Ecuador, is about a small yet persistant hummingbird who is determined to save his forest from a fire drop by drop, while other bigger animals stand back, believeing that nothing they do will make a difference.

I’ve written before about Wikileaks and how it provides a venue for whistleblowers to leak documents without fear of being caught. Since I last wrote about Wikileaks, which was precisely 2 years ago, the site has leaked numerous other documents, and for obvious reasons, has faced some strong legal challenges. The site appears to continue operations none-withstanding and in fact today released a 2007 classified video from Iraq dubbed “Collateral Murder” (Huffington Post) showing air-strikes killing a Reuters’ news photographer among other individuals.

Of course, whistle-blowing organizations like Wikileaks have detractors, and some of the criticism is definitely valid. But Thomas Jefferson didn’t say “Information is the currency of democracy.” for no reason. Corruption exists, and therefore the placement of checks and balances, including systems to reveal information in the interest of the public, is a necessary part of preserving our democratic societies. Some of these truths may not be particularly pleasant to see. However, Asa says it best:

There is fire on the mountain and nobody seems to be on the run.
There is fire on the mountain top and no one is running.
One day the river will overflow
and there’ll be nowhere for us to go
And we will run, run… wishing we had put out the fire.

There is incredible injustice in our world today, and many individuals and groups who consider themselves to be above the law. But the whistle-blowers, journalists, and photographers who risk all to uncover truths are much like dukdukdiya, the little hummingbird, doing their part to put out the fires before they consume us all.

We ask them, “What are you doing?”
They say, “We are doing what we can.”

I have exciting news! Today we sent out the final version of MSURJ (the McGill Science Undergraduate Research Journal) to the printers. We’ve completely revamped the look of the journal from previous years, and we have more research articles than ever. Our launch is in about a week when everything is going to come together, and that’s definitely the best part of being Editors-in-Chief. It’s been a great run.