A Season of Infamy in Iran Editorial Re-Centering

A Season of Infamy in Iran Editorial

Re-Centering: The Turning of the Tide and Robert Hayden Frederick Glaysher VOLUME 17, NUMBER 4 • PUBLISHED QUARTERLY

Editorial Board: IN THIS ISSUE FIRUZ KAZEMZADEH BETTY J. FISHER 2 A Season of Infamy in Iran HOWARD GAREY 4 Interchange: Letters from and to the Editor

Consultant in Poetry: 9 Re-Centering: The Turning of the Tide and WILLIAM STAFFORD Robert Hayden by Frederick G/aysher

19 "Grand Prix de la Poesie" for Robert Hayden by Rosey Pool WORLD ORDER is published quarterly by the National Spiritual Assembly of the Baha'1s 25 A New Portfolio of Poems of the United States, 415 Linden Avenue, Wil Introduced and Selected mette, IL 60091. Application to Mail at Sccond class postage rates is pending at Wilmette, IL. by William St4jford POSTMASTER: Send address changes to WORLD ORDER, 415 Linden Avenue, Wil· 46 Authors & Artists in This Issue mettc, IL 60091. The views expressed herein are those of the au thors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the publisher, the National Spiritual Assem ~ly of the Baha' [s of the United States, or of the Editorial Board. Manuscripts should be type written and double spaced throughout, witli the footnotes at the end. The contributor should keep a carbon copy. Return postage should be included. Send manuscripts and other editorial correspondence to WORLD ORDER, 415 Lin den Avenue, Wilmette, II. 60091. Subscription rates: U.S.A., 1 year, $10.00; 2 years, $18.00; sinitle copies, $3.00. All Other countries, 1 year, S12.00; 2 years, $22.00; single copies $3.00. Copyright © 1984, National Spiritual Assem bly of the Bah:l'ls of the United States, All Rights Reserved. Printed in the U.S.A. ISSN 0043-8804

2 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

A Season of Infamy in Iran

OR IRAN the summer of 1983 has been a season of infamy. The world has F watched in stunned disbelief as the mullahs continued their genocidal campaign against the Baha'i community. They first hanged eight men in Shiraz, and later ten women, three of them teenagers. The Revolutionary prosecutor, Siyyid I::Iusayn Musavl, defying truth and ordinary decency, announced the official banning of all Baha'i institutions and proclaimed membership in them a criminal act. The charges were either specific and patently false- spying and sabotage-or abstract and ridiculous warring against God. Though the mullahs have always maintained that there was a mere hand ful of Baha'ls in the Islamic Republic, the prosecutor now claimed that "there are many Baha'ls in Iran. But some of these people are spies . .. . " Those who are not spies, the prosecutor said, will be free to practice their be liefs provided they do so privately, and provided they do not invite others to participate, do not spread the Faith, are not active, do not form Assemblies, do not give information to others, and do not cooperate with Baha'i institu tions. Those who consent to live in silence, to see their community die a slow death will be permitted to do so. This is the extent of the humanitarianism of Iran's Shiite clergy. Iranian Baha'ls obedient to their religious commandment not to violate the law have disbanded all their institutions. There no longer exists an orga nized community. By a definition contained in a charter to which Iran is sig natory, an act of genocide has been committed. Is this another step on the gruesome path toward the physical extermination of hundreds of thousands of men, women, and children?

4 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

Interchange LETIERs FROM AND To THE EDITOR

THE ARTS, almost from the moment In this issue William Stafford, our cur WORLD ORDER began publication in 1966, rent poetry editor, carries on the tradition. have played an important part in the maga He has assembled poems from the well zine. Armed with Baha'u'llah's assertion known and from the neophyte, a collection that "'Arts, crafts and sciences uplift the that we think coheres and makes a state world of being, and are conducive to its exal ment about the fears, hopes, and aspirations tation,'" the Editors deliberately pursued a of humanity. policy that would balance the best of hu manity's creative thoughts expressed in •f * * words with those expressed in poetry, art A HOUSEKEEPING note for our readers: As and photography. of 1 September 1983 all manuscripts and The result has been a succession of arti other editorial correspondence should be cles on various aspects of the arts (general sent to the WORLD ORDER Editorial Board, and theoretical) and on such diverse artists, 415 Linden Avenue, Wilmette, IL 60091. poets, and artisans as Robert Hayden, Wal Three copies of manuscripts are re ter Hatke, Mark Tobey, Mildred Mottahe quired-the original ribbon copy and two deh, and Shinji Yamamoto. Reproductions legible carbon or machine copies. Manu of paintings, movie reviews (not as many as scripts, whether typewritten or produced we would like), and photographs have also on a word processor, should be double been an important part of our magazine. spaced and have ample side, top, and bottom Perhaps the art to which most attention ma.rgins. Page numbers should appear in the has been given has been poetry. Certainly upper right-hand corner. Footnotes should Robert Hayden, our poetry editor from be numbered serially and should appear at 1968 through 1980, with his patient good the end of the article, not at the bottoms of humor, taught his colleagues to look upon pages. Please refer to previous issues of poetry as a much more integral part of the WORLD ORDER or to the MLA Handbook magazine than space filler-a lesson we hope for footnote format. we have internalized. In 1971 Hayden took Manuscripts produced on word proces the magazine's commitment to poetry a step sors should be printed out on a letter-quality further by proposing a periodic anthology printer. Pages should be separated, and side of poetry to be introduced with his own bands of perforated paper should be re comments on the state of poetry. The first moved. Lines should not be justified. anthology appeared in our Spring 1971 issue Subscriptions and queries about subscrip and a second one in Summer 1975. When tions should continue to be sent to W ORLD Hayden died in 1980, he was collecting ORDER Subscriber Service, 415 Linden Ave poems for a third anthology. nue, Wilmette, IL 60091. 5

To the Editor of Krishna is true, namely, that there is a great TRILINGUAL BABY deal of legendary and mythological material I particulary enjoyed Jane Merrill Filstrup's ac woven into his portrait, his conclusion that he count "Bringing Up Baby Bilingual," in the Win was not a historical figure is ... somewhat pre ter 1982-83 issue, and admired her tenacity for mature. Indeed, it is based on a very narrow con following through on such a tremendous task. ception of historicity, one whose premise holds Several weeks after reading the article I received a that historical existence can only be postulated letter from my brother living in Panama in by reference to a certain type of symbol-set, that which he described the linguistic progress of his of historical narrative. Legend, myth, and epic are daughter who has a Persian mother, with Persian a priori excluded as sources of historical investi grandparents living nearby. She is now 3Yz years gation. They are not seen as possible reflections old and has successfully incorporated three lan of historical events and characters {although ex guages-English, Persian, and Spanish-into her aggerated) but as mere depictions of timeless everyday speech. ideals. Without entering into the complexities of About a year ago my brother (both English a methodological argument I feel that chis ap and Spanish-speaking) was concerned that she proach not only depicts a cultural bias, but it is seemed ro ignore instructions in English, but re often impotent as an explanatory tool. In this re sponded to Persian and Spanish. Her mother gard, one might wonder how "the inspiring and spoke to her in Persian mixed with Spanish, even soul-stirring story of Krishna blossomed forth in though her mother is fluent in English as well, Indian literature" without the benefit of a his and my brother generally spoke English. She ob torical catalyst. This, of course, is not to say that viously heard much Spanish around her as a re religious legends always demand historical coun sult of living in Central America. terparts, but to deny such relationships out of It has only been recently that she began differ hand because they belong to certain genres is to entiating between the three languages and now my mind clearly unacceptable. In fact, working calmly translates Persian into English for her fa down from this point of view Christ's historicity ther, and translates English into Persian for her could be denied. 2) Having begun from a ques mother, speaking to each in their respective tionable premise Mr. Earl then proceeds to claim mother-tongues, just as Mrs. Filstrup described that Shoghi Effendi held the same position. her twins as doing for each parent. U, as Profes Again, I fee l this approach to be problematic. In sor Lambert discovered, "bilingual children are this vein, the fact that the Guardian cites the Gita at an advantage in an aspect of creativity known rather than Krishna seems a ... technicality, as as "'flexible thinking,'" how much more advan to separate the two, at least in the Hindu context, tageous is a trilingual upbringing! is meaningless. It would be like quoting from the REGINA M . BLUM Qur'an while at the same time doubting the exis Highland Park, illinois tence of Mul]ammad, for contrary to what Mr. Earl infers, followers of Krishna do not see him as a mere "ideal." H something is to be made of MORE ABOUT KRISHNA the fact that Shoghi Effendi cites the book in con Concerning Mr. David M. Earl's letter "About trast to citing other Manifestations, would it not Krishna" in your Winter 1982-83 issue, I would be more frugal to interpret this as the Guardian's like to make a few comments: 1) While much of awareness of the difficulties involved in untan what Mr. Earl says about our current knowledge gling the "historical" Krishna from the "mytho- 6 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

logical" Krishna rather than ruling his historical fore, cannot be associated with ics origins. While existence out of court? Moreover, one might ask chis is cenainly true, I see no connection between why Shoghi Effendi would bother to use such a chis position and che possible existence of a his prophecy in the context of ocher "valid" histori torical Krishna. Perhaps popular Baha'i litera cal eschacological claims if be did not feel cbac ic ture in che West has identified Krishna as che was associated with a Manifestation of God? In "founder" of Hinduism, which he was not, but addition to this, the facts chat a) during her trips co conclude, therefore, that be is only an allegori to India Rutilyyih Khanum freely referred to cal abstraction is a questionable jump in logic. Krishna in the same context as Christ and Mu In conclusion I would like to point out that as tiammad (Amatu'l-Baha Vists India, p. 105}, and a student of comparative religion I have no per b) Dr. Esslemont's Baha'u'lldh and the New Era sonal reason for arguing in favor of the "histori (which was greatly praised by Shoghi Effendi and cal" Krishna. lt could well be that there was no translated into Urdu . .. [at] his urging) refers co such "person" as Krishna. What I am opposed to Krishna as a Manifestation seem to indicate chat is the cultural bias that assumes this is so from its Shoghi Effendi did not see Krishna as just (and own ground rules (often without applying those here I emphasize just) "an allegory representing same ground rules to other religious figures) and Absolute Truth." chen interprets che Baha'i position in a similar 3) Mr. Earl points out that Krishna appears light. WILLIAM N. GARLINGTON late in the development of Hinduism and, there- Calabasas, California 7

9 Re-Centering: The Turning of the Tide and Robert Hayden

by FREDERICK GIAYSHER

I This is the dead land This is cactus land Here the stone images Are raised. .. . Eliot

HE MOST CHARACTERISTIC feature of our age is anomie. Whether one looks T in the domain of society or of the individual, the lack of a normative standard is abundantly manifest. This is apparent in the work of Jacques Derrida, who as serts that an unparalleled "event" or "rupture" has occurred-specifically, the loss of the center. More tellingly, he says, "This affirmation then determines the non-cen ter otherwise than as a loss of the center." The non-center is "thought" or "dis course." The center has not been lost because it never really existed; it was only a fallacious structuring principle. At last, mankind has passed beyond the dream of "full presence. " 1 Such thinking, perhaps it should be called postnihilistic, is typical of a great deal of contempor ary philosophy and critical theory and is shared, in some form or anoth er, by many writers.2 In effect, many people con clude that hu manism is dead and that it never had a legitimate philosophical base. And they do

Copyright © 1983 by Frederick Glaysher 1. Jacques Derrida, "Structure, Sign, and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sci ences," in The Structuralist Controversy, ed. Richard Macksey and Eugenio Donato (Balti more: John Hopkins Univ. Press, 1972), p. 249: "the determination of Being as presence in all senses of this word. It would be possible to show that all the names related to fundament.als, to principles, or to the center have always designated the constant of a presence-eidos, arche, telos, energeia, ousia (essence, existence, substance, subject) aletheia, transcendentali ty, consciousness, or conscience, God, man, and so forth." 2. That such thinking, without splitting hairs over definition, suffuses other areas of endeavor is indisputable. Hans Kiing, in Art and the Question ofMeaning (trans. Edward Querin [New York: Crossroads, 1981D, examines the ubiquity of nihilism in modern art. One of his observations, on page 29, is that"Art is seen then no longer against a pantheistic but against a nihilistic background. I say this as diagnosing, not as moralizing" (his italics}. It is basically the same impulse of modern society that Udo Schaefer indicts in The Light Shin eth in Darkness (Oxford: George Ronald, 1977), p. 13: "Our contemporary way of thinking is characterised by the loss of belief in God and the loss of values which are universally ac knowledged. Atheism is a world-wide phenomenon. The 'absence' of God is the stigma of our time." Especially relevant here is Schaefer's quotation of Hans-Joachim Schoeps on page 123 (see footnote 442} because Schoeps indicates the pervasiveness and smug self-righteous ness of present-day nihilism: "'Jews and Christians are today in much the same situation: one of non-belief. The great break of the ages, the real change in the times which, as is well known, took place in the last 150 years ... has brought about an entirely new state of affairs in the last few decades: that of non-belief which refuses all discussion-even a polemic one with the witnesses and bearers of faith, which adopts towards the history of the salvation of man witnessed throughout the centuries, an attitude no longer of incredulity and doubt but much more one of disbelief and indifference .... This is a catastrophic process which has 10 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

so with better logic, as Gerald Graff maintains, than did the New Critics and mod ernists who sought to preserve humanism as a necessary, "supreme fiction."J The only solution to the predicament is an obvious one; but as in all ages that are indoctrinated with specious, epicyclical systems of thought, it is difficult to per ceive because it is so deceptively simple. We are habituated to the aberrant and ab struse. We have confused the meaning of the word simple with simplistic. Anomie vitiates perception. Hence we are unable to recognize that we do not live in a Ptol emaic universe-that is to say, a solipsistic one. Rather, our psychic solar system, despite appearances and assertions to the contrary, is, and always was, and always will be, centered around the sun. The center has never been lost, merely our ability to perceive it. The realization that a "rupture" has occurred in our relationship with the cen ter is not restricted to our century. Derrida himself does not claim that such a real ization is confined to our time or that the "rupture" began with a specific individ ual. Instead, he states it is the consequence of the "spirit of an age, our own" in the broadest sense. 4 During the last century many people were aware that an anoma lous change was taking place. For example, Matthew Arnold, in his preface to Poems in 1853, wrote that "the calm ... the disinterested objectivity have disap peared: the dialogue of the mind with itself has commenced." Although Arnold himself was often tainted by what he deplored, he was still perceptive enough to recognize and lament the beginning of a new, virulent self-consciousness. In "Do ver Beach" he considers the "rupture." The speaker hears the sound of pebbles grating against the shore as they are tossed about by the waves and observes that The Sea of Faith Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled. But now I only hear Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar, Retreating, to the breath Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear And naked shingles of the world. It is precisely the sea of faith that has disappeared from modern life. Its "Retreat ing, to the breath I Of the night-wind" has culminated in the horrifying dehuman ization of our century. One outcome of the "rupture" has been that writers and scholars have redefined anomie as a virtue. Some of them elevate solipsism and absurdity into the great not remained unnoticed either, but which today is becoming increasingly clear and more threatening.... This age is no longer one of Jewish-Chriscian belief; as regards its qualita tive nature, it is already something quite different.'" To return largely to literature, J. Hillis Miller is quite aware of the difference though he does not concentrate on the concomitant nihilism: "Poetry was meaningful [throughout Western civilization] in the same way as na ture itself-by a communion of the verbal symbols with the reality they named. The history of modem literature is in part the history of the splitting apart of this communion. This splitting apart has been matched by a similar dispersal of the cultural unity of man, God, na ture, and language.'' The Disappearance ofGod: Five Nineteenth· Century Writers (Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard Univ. Press, 1975), p. 3. 3. Gerald Graff, Literature Against Itself: Literary Ideas in Modern Society (Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1979), p. 52. My paper owes Graff a general debt. 4. Derrida, "Structure, Sign, and Play.'' THE TURNJNG OF THE TIDE 11

truths of existence. Wallace Stevens exemplifies this attitude to an extraordinary degree. For example, in his poem "Of Modern Poetry," he writes: The poem of the mind in the act of finding What will suffice. It has not always had To find; the scene was set; it repeated what Was in the script. Then the theatre was changed To something else. Its past was a souvenir. This quotation is characteristic of much of modern literature. The dialogue of the mind with itself has not only commenced but has triumphed over and obliterated objective, historical reality. Literature's raison d'etre has indeed become "some thing else." T. S. Eliot and W. H . Auden were virtually the only poets who pon dered and lamented the significance of the "rupture"; all others, W. B. Yeats pre eminently, sought substitutes, "What will suffice." This strange phenomenon has worsened in so-called postmodern literature. It is unfortunate that writers fail to realize substitution is possible only for a relatively short time. The belief that literature is the "supreme fiction," however, is one beyond which, as has already been noted, some present-day writers claim to have gone. They discard humanism, and rightly so, as a fiction based solely on the mind's pro pensity for security, the dream for "full presence." It is fitting co cast off humanism because it was and is a mere parasite living upon the desiccated carcass of religion. T he last two centuries have witnessed a devolution of man's perception of life. First, the centrality of revealed religion, whether Christianity, Judaism, or Islam, was diminished by the secularizing influence of materialistic capitalism and com munism. Next, humanism and several forms of aestheticism tried to salvage in one way or another (and the authors who attempted this are legion) the fundamentally humane values that have their highest validation only in religion. 5 Finally, the dominant religion of modern civilization, materialism, has thoroughly repudiated the truth of life's basic spiritual reality. There remains no real challenge to this new dogmatism. Vague, embattled nostalgia for love and morality is not enough; John Gardner's On Moral Fiction boils down to little else.6 It is astounding that the loss of the center has often been misinterpreted as the great postmodern "break through," instead of the spiritual and intellectual failure that it is. Since the values of che so-called avant-garde have come to be identical with the values of today's complacent society, the only solution co the predicament is a restoration of the center.7 For it is the center that historically has been the only effective challenge to such banality. But how can the center be restored? Esoteric, individualistic systems and exis tentialism's negating of any coherent world view invariably result in solipsism be cause there is no external authority behind the artists; there is no reality to their "visions." Certainly, Yeats' "communicators" cannot be taken seriously; even he

5. Leszek Kolakowski, Religion: Ifthere is no God . .. On God, the Devil, Sin and other Worries of the so-called Philosopby of Religion (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1982), pp. 186-87. 6. John Gardner, On Moral Ficticn (New York: Basic Books, 1978). 7. Graff, Literature Against Itself, pp. 2-3. Professor Graff notes only the identical philosophical nature of the "entrenched ideologies" and the "revisionary formulas." His book is an excellent analysis of the problem. 12 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

did not believe in them.8 Reference to other men-system builders-as authorities can only go so far before deteriorating into futile and muddled "discourse." The in tellectual cannibalizing of structuralism and poststructuralism dearly demon strates this point. Eliot perceived correctly the plight of modern literature and per haps would have viewed postmodernism as simply more of the same: When one man's "view of life" is as good as another's, all the more enterprising spirits will naturally evolve their own; and where there is no custom to deter mine what the task of literature is, every writer will determine for himself, and the more enterprising will range as far afield as possible.9 Ultimately the center, "custom," has been lost in literature because it bas been lost in life. Therefore, we need to restore the center to life before it can be restored to literature. But how can the center be restored? The religions, which professed a humane, spiritual conception of man, are antiquated. They are only regional; only relatively limited areas of the globe have ever found any one of them palatable, perhaps large ly because they became bound with local mores. Moreover, they do not meet the requirements of the present age, and all have frequently become more of a hin drance to life in this century than a confirmation and enrichment of it. Surely, a man-made syncretic religion is not the way to restore the center-that is, to restore man's belief in God, life, and himself. The patent answer to our question is that only God can restore the center; the truly remarkable fact is that He has.10

II The promised day is come . ... Baha'u'llah

WITHOUT DISCUSSING the history of the Baha'i Faith, I shall briefly outline its ma jor tenets. The central claim of the Baha'i Faith can be found in the following pas sage by its Prophet-Founder, Baha'u'llah: The Revelation which, from time immemorial, hath been acclaimed as the Purpose and Promise of all the Prophets of God, and the most cherished Desire of His Messengers, hath now, by virtue of the pervasive Will of the Almighty and at His irresistible bidding, been revealed unto men. The advent of such a Revelation hath been heralded in all the sacred Scriptures. 11 Note the assertion that the advent of His revelation has been foretold "in all the sa-

8. W. B. Yeats, A Vision (1937; rpt. New York: Collier Books, 1966), pp. 8-9. 9. T. S. Eliot, After Strange Gods: A Primer ofModem Heresy (New York: Harcoun, 1934), p. 34. 10. Schaefer's comment on the earlier cited passage by Schoeps is on target: "This condi tion, noted by many thinkers of our age . .. cannot be altered by human means-by a refor mation-but only by God, i.e., through a new revelation. AU human attempts to breathe new life into the old religions will fail. ... " (Schaefer, Light Shineth in Darkness, p. 123n.) Similarly, Hawthorne, for all his "blackness," reached the same conclusion: "I find that my respect for clerical people, as such, and my faith in the utility of their office, decreases daily. We certainly do need a new revelation-a new system-for there seems to be no life in the old one." (Quoted by F. 0 . Manhiessen, American Renaissance: Art and Expression in the Age of Emerson and Whitman [New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1941; reprinted 1977), p. 361.) THE TURNING OF THE TIDE 13

cred Scriptures." Whether in the Bible, the Qur'an, or the various writings of Bud dhism and Hinduism, the prophecy of a future world teacher or prophet is an om nipresent theme. If the claims of Baha'u'llah are true, they have tremendous and unprecedented significance for mankind, for He professes to be not just another prophet in a long line of many but the One Who shall usher in a truly global civil ization beyond the confines of nationalistic regionalism. Baha'u'llah succinctly expresses His most important precept in the following sentence: "The earth is but one country, and mankind its citizens."12 He asserts that past dispensations resulted in the successive establishment of the unity of the family, the tribe, the nation, and that through the power of His own Revelation mankind shall attain worldwide unity, universal and lasting peace, the time when swords shall be beaten into plowshares. Shoghi Effendi, Guardian of the Baha'i Cause until his passing in 1957, expounded this central teaching: Let there be no mistake. The principle of the Oneness of Mankind-the pivot round which all the teachings of Baha'u'llah revolve-is no mere outburst of ig norant emotionalism or an expression of vague and pious hope. Its appeal is not to be merely identified with a reawakening of the spirit of brotherhood and good-will among men .... It ... stands inseparably associated with an institu tion adequate to embody its truth, demonstrate its validity, and perpetuate its influence. It implies an organic change in the structure of present-day society, a change such as the world has not yet experienced. It constitutes a challenge, at once bold and universal, to outworn shibboleths of national creeds. ... 13 Our age is dominated so thoroughly by anomie, ennui, and cynicism that the claims of the Baha'i Faith cannot avoid sounding preposterous. However, they sound much more sane and credible than the "supreme fictions" advanced by such writers as Nietzsche, Stevens, Camus, Derrida, and Yeats. Moreover, the wgem need today for the unity of mankind ought to be glaringly obvious to any open minded, thinking person. What distinguishes the Baha'i Faith from other religions is its association "with an institution adequate to embody its truth." This institution, the Universal House of Justice, was given its authority by Baha'u'-llah Himself before His death in 1892. No other prophet has so dearly stipulated the fundamental laws and ad ministrative institutions of His faith. The members of the Universal House of Jus tice, first elected by Baha'ls in 1963, represent numerous races and nationalities. In its structure the Universal House of Justice blends together the best features of all existing political systems yet contains none of their shortcomings. Shoghi Effendi elaborated upon the future of this world administration: A world federal system, ruling the whole earth and exercising unchallenge able authority over its unimaginably vast resources, blending and embodying the ideals of both the East and the West, liberated from the curse of war and its miseries ... a system in which Force is made the servant of Justice, whose life is sustained by its universal recognition of one God and by its allegiance to one

11. Bab3'u ' ll~ , Gleanings from the Writings ofBaha'u'/Uh, trans., Shogbi Effendi, 2d ed. (Wilmette, Ill.: Baha'i Publishing Trust, 1976), p. 5. 12. Ibid., p. 250. 13. Shoghi Effendi, Call to the Nations: Extracts from the Writings of Shoghi Effendi [comp. The Universal House of)ustice](Haifa: Baha'i World Center, 1977), pp. 30-31. 14 WORLD ORDER; SUMMER 1983

common Revelation-such is the goal towards which humanity, impelled by the unifying forces of life, is moving. 14 The dispensation of Baha'u'Uah is worldwide in scope: it favors neither the Orient nor the Occident; and it contains many precepts that make sense only in a context larger than the nation, precepts that are indeed calling into being a globally minded civilization. But it must be observed that the Baha'i Faith does not claim to be a new religion. If it is to be correctly understood, what Baha'u'llah revealed must be given due rec ognition: "'This is the changeless Faith of God, eternal in the past, eternal in the future.' "15 m Within the rock the undiscovered suns release their light. Hayden

ROBERT HAYDEN wrote matchless poetry that has justly won international ac claim. Two of his poems in particular reveal how deeply aware he was, to invert Nietzsche, of the "tremendous event ... [that] has not yet reached the ears of man." 16 The first of these poems, "The Night-Blooming Cereus," is perhaps his most beautifully metaphoric treatment of the turning of the tide. The title itself tersely presents the basic image-the cereus cactus that opens its striking blossom only in the season of darkness: And so for nights we waited, hoping to see the heavy bud break into flower. 17 The description of the bud as "heavy," pregnant with potential flower, creates a sense of anticipation. It is further described as packed with its miracle and swaying in the air, "as though impelled I by stirrings within itself." Later in the poem the plant is again partially personified as possessing a "focused energy of will." The speaker then states something that may be the reaction of many modern observers: It repelled as much as it fascinated me

sometimes . . .. After the speaker attributes to it grotesque, bestial qualities, he addresses someone he refers to as "dear," undoubtedly a loved one:

14. Ibid., p. 56. 15. Baha'u'llah, The Seven Valleys and che Four Valleys, trans. Ali-Kuli Khan and Marzieh Gail, 3d ed. (Wilmette, Ill.: Baha'i Publishing Trust, 1978), p. xii. 16. From "The Gay Science" in The Portable Nietzsche, ed. and trans., Walter Kaufmann (1954, Viking Press; rpt. New York: Penguin Books, 1980), p. 96. Cf. Thus Spoke 7.arathus tra, page 124, same edition. For commentary see Kaufmann's "The Death of God and the Revaluation" in Nietzsche: A Collection of Critical Essays, ed. Robert C. Solomon (Notre Dame, Indiana: Univ. of Notre Dame Press, 1980). 17. Robert Hayden, Angle ofAscent (New York: Liveright, 1975), p. 24. All of che fol lowing extracts from Hayden's poems are from chis book. THE TURNING OF TH£ TIDE 15

But you, my dear, conceded less co che bizarre than co the imminence of bloom. Yet we agreed

we ought to celebrate the blossom, paint ourselves, dance in honor of

archaic mysteries when it appeared. The implication is unmistakable that the speaker himself has been struck by the "bizarre" much more than his companion; she has been couched by the "immi nence of bloom." Yet they concur chat they "ought to celebrate the blossom." The references to dancing and the painting of themselves have a joyous, primitive con notation. This sense of primordial joy is centered in the fact that they are honoring "archaic mysteries," mysteries that are being restored before their intellectual eyes. II Their reaction is the only appropriate one: We dropped trivial tasks

and marvelling beheld at last the achieved flower. While one recalls chat the speaker is repelled as much as fascinated-"sometimes" that time is now in the past. The poem ends with the following stanzas: Lunar presence, foredoomed, already dying, it charged the room with plangency

older than human cries, ancient as prayers invoking Osiris, Krishna, Tezdtlip6ca.

We spoke in whispers when we spoke at all . .. "Foredoomed, already dying" emphasizes the cyclical nature of the flower and im plies that it, coo, shall become outworn since it is a "Lunar presence." Yet the un equivocal suggestion is chat the newly opened flower is the one worth celebrating,

18. Wilburn Williams, Jr., "Covenant of Timelessness & Time: Symbolism & History in Robert Hayden'sAng/e ofAscent,• Massachusetts Review, 18 (Wimer 1977), 745. 16 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

the one worthy of their "marvelling," their primordial human awe and adoration. The poem "and all the atoms cry aloud" is the last one in Hayden's superb se quence of poems "Words in the Mourning Time." This sequence irrefutably dem onstrates that he was sensible of the madness and evil around him. 1n an interview Hayden once discussed these poems and specifically referred to the last one: The final poem is the culmination, the climax of the sequence. For me, it con tains the answers to the questions the preceding poems have stated or implied. If I seem to come to any conclusion about injustice, suffering, violence at all, it's in ... the last poem, written originally for a Baha'i occasion. Baha'u'llah urged the absolute, inescapable necessity for human unity, the recognition of the fun damental oneness of mankind. He also prophesied that we'd go through sheer hell before we achieved anything like world unity-partly owing to our inabil ity to love. 19 Hayden did not find in the Baha'i Faith a vague utopian dream. He was deeply con scious, as the religion is, of human suffering and evil. Yet he believed that the only true theodicy for today was to be found in the Baha'i dispensation. Even a cursory acquaintance with his poetry must leave us with this realization. The Baha'i writings frequently conceive of the new dispensation as releasing re vitalizing spiritual energy. Often this energy is described as influencing the rocks, the dust, every atom of existence-hence the title of the poem, wherein all the atoms of creation proclaim the new dispensation. The words "cry aloud" in them selves connote a more emphatic attitude than can be fo und in "The Night-Bloom ing Cereus." This same increased emphasis exists in the repeated line "I bear Him witness now."20 The adverb "now" especially intensifies the line. The sentence may be an allusion to the Baha'i prayer that begins "I bear witness, 0 my God, that Thou hast created me to know Thee and to worship Thee."21 This repeated asser tion announces with uncommon certainty, as the entire poem does, the long-await ed turning of the tide. The poem contains several other allusions to the Baha'i writings. The words "shrill pen," "wronged, exiled One," "surgeon, architect I of our hope of peace"; the acclaiming by the "stones," "seas," and "stars"; the quotation '"I was but a man I like others, asleep upon I My couch'" (from Baha'u'llah's Most Holy Book, the K.itab-i-Aqdas)-all have their origin, as do many subtleties in Hayden's poetry, in Baha'i scripture. The tone of "and all the atoms cry aloud" is much more elevated than that of "The Night-Blooming Cereus" and is free of the somewhat veiled disclosure of that poem. The atmosphere of quiet awe has changed to urgent certainty. Aware ness of the "imminence of bloom" pervades the poem. Furthermore, it firmly places Baha'u'llah in history: "renewal of I the covenant of tjmelessness with

19. John O'Brien,lnterviews with Black Writers (New York: Liveright, 1973), p. 119. 20. Williams H. Hansell, "The Spiritual Unity of Robert Hayden's Angle ofAscent, " Black American literature Forum, 13, no. 1 (Spring 1979), 26. H ansell is one of the few critics who appreciates the importance of the Baha'f Faith to Hayden. Unfortunately, his under standing of it is poor and results in several inaccurate statements. His reading of this poem is a case in point. For a more reliable and general reading of Hayden's poetry see the earlier cited essay by Wilburn Willams, Jr.; or see Constance]. Post, "Image and Idea in the Poetry of Robert Hayden," College Language Association journal, 20 {1976), pp. 164-75. 21. Baha'u'llah, Pra-yers and Meditations, trans. Shoghi Effendi (Wilmene, lll.: Baha'i Publishing Trust, 1938), p. 314. THE TURNING OF TH£ TIDE 17 time." Once again, the reality of the existence of the center has been restored for man. The closing triplet reads: I bear Him witness now: toward Him our history in its disastrous quest for meaning is impelled. The use of "impelled" is an outstanding example of Hayden's choosing the perfect word. It forcibly asserts the speaker's conviction that only the new rain can cause the wasteland to bloom once again; that only the turning of the tide can replenish the sea of faith and respiritualize and unite mankind; that only the new dispensa tion can decisively challenge bourgeois materialism. Life is fundamentally a spiritu al phenomenon, and though man-made ideologies may be briefly substituted, they soon prove to be hollow and barren; by their very nature they increase anomie; they merely raise another stone image in the desert.

"Grand Prix de la Poesie" for Robert Hayden by ROSEY E. POOL

HE WEST AFRICAN Republic of Senegal is as far as I know the only Tcountry whose Head of State is a poet of major importance. Ever since the country gained its independence in 1959, Senegal has been governed by President Leopold Sedar Senghor whose peotry ranks among the best of French contemporary literature. Moreover Senghor is one of the origina tors of the idea of "Negritude" or race-awareness which I see as the univer sal human acceptance of one's specific qualities, the good along with the not so good, complete acceptance on every level one's race included. In that way I who am not a Negro, undergo my "Negritude." It is not surprising that the First World Festival of Negro Arts therefore was held at Dakar, Senegal, and that Negro painters, art historians, sculp tors, composers, musicians, actors and dancers, and especially writers from all over the world responded to President Senghor's, Unesco's and the So ciete Africaine de Culture's invitation to submit their work in competition for a number of awards to be given during the Festival. I, a native and citizen of the Netherlands, since 1949 a resident of Lon don, and in fact something like a "flying Dutchman" have for almost four decades been working on the subject of the poetry of the American Negro. For many years I have known Robert Hayden. For many years I knew he was a Baha'L I was not. I remember very vividly my first personal meeting with Bob Hayden. At Fisk University, Nashville, Tennessee, where he has been teaching English and creative writing for many years. I remember our first long conversation about an important poem he was trying to write about the Bab. No explanation was needed. I knew. I understood. I had known about the Faith since I visited Israel many years ago. I had not given in . . . made my declaration [of adherence to the Baha'f Faith] not earlier than in May 1965, when I was a temporary visitor at Huntsville, Alabama. On that night Robert Hayden happened to be at Huntsville to attend a Ne gro writers conference at Alabama Agricultural and Mechanical College where I taught for that semester. The First World Festival of Negro Arts was in preparation. I had no hope at all to get [sic] involved. Although my subject is the poetry of the

Dr. Pool's account of how Rohen Hayden's A Ballad ofRemembranc e came to be entered in the competition of the First World Festival of Negro Arts, held in Dakar, Senegal, in 1962, was provided by Marion Hofman to whom Dr. Pool gave these papers before her death. Ponions of it will appear in John S. Hatcher's fonhcoming book on Robert Hayden._ to be published by George Ronald, From the Auroral Darkness: Continuity in the Life and Po etry of Robert Hayden. 20 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

Afro-American, I am not an American. So the American Committee for the Festival could not delegate me. Although I live in London, I am a Hol lander. So, I thought, I had no right to claim [the] interest of the British Committee. A Dutch Committee for the Festival had not been set up. Sud denly, quite out of the blue, the British Committee invited me to sit as a member of the pre-selection jury for literary prizes for anglophone authors at the First World Festival of Negro Arts. That was 17th January 1966. I re ceived a list of works submitted, learned that only works published be tween January 1962 and September 1965 could be entered, that twelve copies of each work should have reached the Festival Head Office in Paris ... before 1st January 1966, that is seventeen days before I was invited to help pre-select the books entered for competition. Two days later, Wednesday the 19th of January, Marion Hofman came to lunch with me. I told her about the pre-selection jury, showed her the list of books submitted and expressed my regret that Robert Hayden's book of poetry A Ballad ofRemembrance was not entered. Like a flash of lightning I realized we might still be able to do something about it. Hayden's book was published in London by Paul Breman, a young independent publisher and incidentally a Hollander, like myself. A telephone call to Paul Breman. An other call to the British Committee for the Festival. An urgent letter to the Festival Office in Paris. An airmail parcel containing twelve copies of A Ballad of Remembrance was hurriedly posted. Robert Hayden's book was accepted for competition. On February 2nd, 3rd and 4th the pre-selection jury sat in Paris. On February 24th, 25th and 26th we gathered in London. Africans from Nigeria, Senegal, Ghana, Ethiopia, writers from the West Indies, Africanists, critics and librarians. Two dozen assorted professions, colors and nationalities. It was our task to sort the chaff from the corn. To suggest three titles in each category of literature (e.g., novel, poetry, essay, drama, reportage} in order to facilitate the work of the Grand Jury at Da kar. Robert Hayden's book of poetry was one of the three selected in the pre-selection jury. Baha'u'llah Himself, a poet and Justice personified, was helping critics to recognize a great poet whose voice had hitherto sung too far away to be heard sufficiently. On 5th March I went on a tour of Morocco with my best friend who is not (yet} a Baha'L We met many of our friends on the way, spent many evenings in their hospitable houses, broke bread with them after a day of fasting, rejoiced with them on the eve of Naw-Ruz. At aJ1 these occasions I read some poems from Robert Hayden'sA Ballad ofRemembrance, told the good news that one of us was among the three finest poets of African de scent from all over the world (the other two being Derek Walcott from S. Lucia and Christopher Okigbo from Nigeria), and asked for the friends' help in the difficult task the Grand Jury was going to have. Do I need to add anything about my private conversations with our Great Beloved Poet?! On the morning of Monday 21st March, the day of Naw-Ruz at Marra kech I received the news that I had been chosen to be one of the adjudica tors of the Grand Jury at Dakar. Would I accept? And in that case would I withdraw my own book Beyond the Blues from competition in the essay GRAND PRJX DE LA POESrE 21

category for which authors of all races could enter? I cabled: "Happy and honored to serve on Grand Jury. Withdraw my book." On 27th March I flew home to London. Unpacked, re-packed and went off to Dakar, Senegal, on the 30th to commence the most difficult work of selecting the best among many fine works of poetry. With me, like a prayer, even before us on the table printed in a book of poetry were Robert Hayden's thoughts singing out in pain, in joy, in recog nition of love of all humanity; the voice of a true poet-background to all our discussions in the magnificent building of the Republic of Senegal's Na tional Assembly. There were moments when I sensed that even "He, who is man beatified and Godly mystery," (from Hayden's poem "In Light Half Nightmare and Half Vision") was holding his breath .... Eight judges argued their points: Langston Hughes, world-famous poet from the United States; Katherine Dunham, citizen of the U.S. and of Hai ti, dancer, anthropologist, author; Davidson Nicoll, author and College President of Sierra Leone; Cyprian Ekwensi, of Nigeria's Ministry of Infor mation, also a writer of major importance; Gerald Moore, of Britain, pro fessor at Makerere College, Kenya, author of many learned books on Afri can writing; Abe Wale, professor of English at the University of Nsukka, Nigeria; Clifford Simmons, director of publications of the National Book League, London; and myself as a specialist in Afro-American and modern African poetry. Of course adjudicators have their private preferences. Of course we had discussions. But also we all together and each of us were trained to recog nize true poetic quality and craftsmanship. Of course ... the Great Poet helped us to judge fairly and to open the eyes and ears of those who had not seen Hayden's words, or heard his voice before. In a last session of the joint English and French language juries our unanimous ballot fell. GRAND PRIX DE LA POESIE: ROBERT HAY DEN OF THE UNITED STATES FOR HIS BOOK "A BALLAD OF REMEMBRANCE," PUBLISHED BY PAUL BREMAN OF LON DON, ENGLAND IN 1962. Deep within me my happiness and gratitude mingled with feelings of warmth and personal attachment which translated themselves into the words of the "crowned poet": He watches in a borrowed garden, prays. And sleepers toss upon their armored beds, Half-roused by golden knocking at the doors of consciousness. Energies like angels dance Glorias of recognition. Within the rock the undiscovered suns release their light. (from "Baha'u'llah In The Garden of Ridwan") 22 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

A press release was written. It read: First prize in the poetry section was awarded to Robert Hayden of the United States for his book, A Ballad ofRemembrance. Robert Hayden, born 1913, professor of English at Fisk University, Nashville, Tennes see, ranks on every level of the critical analysis of poetry among the fin est of our anglophone contemporaries. A Ballad of Remembrance is the work of a remarkable craftsman, an outstanding singer of words, a strik ing thinker, a poete pur song. He gives glory and dignity to America through deep attachment to the past, present and future of his race. Afri ca is in his soul, the world at large in his mind and heart. That evening, Thursday 7th April, Nuit de la Poesie, the President of the Festival, Poet Alioune Diop, in the presence of the President of the Repub lic [of] Senegal, Poet Leopold Sedar Senghor, proclaimed to the audience in Dakar's Theatre Serrano, the wonderful news about the artistic recogni tion of our Brother Baha'i Robert Hayden of Nashville, Tennessee. This I wanted to share with you. In His Service. ROSEY E. P OOL, London

\New Portfolio of Poems

HlS GATHERING of poems adds a third to the series Robert rHayden edited and introduced in the Spring 1971 and the ummer 1975 issues of WORLD ORDER. For each of those he 1rote an introduction that noted circumstances and trends in urrent literature and commented on vision and order and on be variety that marks current poetry. The Hayden portfolios, because of bis range of interest and vide acquaintance, brought in work by widely known writers uch as Radcliffe Squires, Nelson and Beth Bentley, Hollis Sum ners, Chad Walsh, and Lewis Turco. For the most part, this new :ollection is based on work submitted through regular channels .nd hence represents a good survey of the kind of poems in the ·egular flow of the office mail. Much of that flow relates to topics and feelings that link to he general content of the magazine-that is, some readers are re .ponding by means of poetry to the life and commitment reflect !d in WORLD ORDER. The poems are engaged. They are moti- 1ated by an urge to share ideas, feelings, beliefs. And these ;harings get a ready and sympathetic reading in the office. After that sympathetic reading there comes another set of ;onsiderations for poems selected and published: they must have :hat wider outreach that makes reading an activity, a literary ex ?erience. This portfolio accepts a flavor that relates to WORLD ORDER and combines that with the economy of expression and balance of presentation that distinguishes poetry. We hope that readers will approve our ways-the welcoming of participation, the receptivity to engaged poetry, and at the same time the steady search for those expressions that combine such content with the felicity and surprise and vigor of the best in literary accomplishment. -WILLIAM STAFFORD 26 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

Listen listen this is serious {the need to talk) there are only days and hours left sliding from hands the earth moves in circles and the moon the w hole moon breaking half-whole half and still the hours with night at hand are you still listening -Elliot Abhau

A Good Dream

In a good dream I dreamed again; I spoke the fall of a night rain; I knew the warmth only a body can know. Quiet in that place, I learned to love The root's reach, a wingless bird Waiting for a wing.

In a good dream I moved with the slow. I watched a seed surprise itself. My ears Shook at the river's low way. All that was hard was forgiven, All flesh rose to its knees.

In a good dream I feared nothing, Not even myself. The wind lifted, And I in it. I moved in a deer's eye, And felt welcome. A tree whispered, Step Into my shape. Every sound is worth a life. -Tom Andrews A NEW PORTFOLIO OF POEMS 27

The Distance Most Disturbing

No doubt there are magnitudes to be found Blossoming in the bright gardens of space. But heream I Uncommonly lost in my own backyard, Pulling weeds and still wondering How far is far, How near is near.

The distance most disturbing Is the gulf of God. What letter, what punctuation Crosses?

Over and over I turn these seeds in my hand Hoping to discern something legible An imprint that might inform- An order, to spring cell doors.

No doubt there are black boles Between the stars Which siphon our higher math Into some kind of matter-less whirlpool, But here I am Overlapped like a seed in a hill, Wondering whether to sink Or struggle- In an ever-present. -Lynn Ann Ascrizzi 28 WORLD ORDER; SUMMER 1983

Up and Down

We don't much notice what's quiet with us, only what changes. But if we change we do notice what's here, can even see how far. A lizard told me this, changing himself from high to low, low to high, not very high, but high enough, for him.

If we change enough (and we will, some day) we'll notice everything,

he said: and I believed him. -Dick Barnes

Psalm

There are trees behind trees beyond forests,

leaves that dance always to their gold turning.

The sun hides inside a pine cone, waits for the spring.

Each sunlit cove holds the one bird that sings;

inside the bark of trees one tongue that whispers: there is only one tree. -Therese Becker A NEW PORTFOLIO OF POEMS 29

In Memory of Paul Haney, Hand of the Cause of God

Tall one, high one, head above us, heart below: it was almost as if we stood beside a second shrine there where he showed us Akka across the bay and sweet gold domed t he day. He almost had to stoop to enter, a giant boy in socks, out guide, with a voice like apple pie but distant, distant- strange. One thought of Lincoln somehow, of frontiers, of pioneers, of faces carved in mountain rock. What a tree he was! A tree so deeply rooted in rich American earth that all nations share his shade. -Bret Breneman

Given Time Women Who Suckle Babies Will Wean The World Away From War

Women lately born from the womb of home bring a sense of family to community, nation and world

With a kind of orderly rhythm they stretch their wings

Slowly the pendulum swings

Long tides roll taking away and bringing back old ideas in new forms -Joyce Anthony Caldwell 30 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

Man Brushing a Woman's Hair

All rests here a tortoise brush calm in his hand

brushing, brushing down her hair supple with the gleam of oil soft about his fingers as he braids, twining her hair long in the slow light.

His hands move with the assurance of a simple act, the silence falling loose and full as the hair spilling down the span of her back. -Daniel Caito

At Liberty

The wolves have had their ruthless way too long, Too often bared their fangs and left their work All bloody in our path. It is enough. We do not need them battering our lives With death, inflicting plagues of butchery With every breath, and walking carelessly Away to come stalking once again.

It is enough. The time has come. Our outrage Beckons us to speak, for silence weighs Too much.Justice must unloose its tongue, The injury be redressed, though only one, For justice cannot keep with compromise. The beasts in men cannot remain unchained; They hunt, and none escape them w hen they come. -Druzelle Cederquist A NEW PORTFOLIO OF POEMS 31

Seasons

Along the landscape dusted all in brown The flame tree rises, heaped with crimson flowers, Color bursting amid shy, green leaves And loved the more for all that's drab beside. So every season brings its flowering tree And none trespass upon the other's time Nor bark confusion by inconstancy, But bring enjoyment as they are defined.

Then let us our own seasons learn to know, Learn to name the gifts that flower therein To watch and find what each one will bestow And graciously accept the time within, Incline our hearts to hear while yet we may The accents that will never come again. -Druzelle Cederquist

Always later

Always later I ask forgiveness and sometimes ask some passerby to note the deep feeling in my face. Always later I ask the wind why hard snow never scores the soft wood of Patty's house, and why the trees outside her porch do not wrap their branches around each other against the cold. Always too late I reach for the person I was and cry Forgive! Forgive! then drive the interstate past the turn where Paul and Lou still play and sing the blues. Back then I set my cheek into Patty's neck, she never pushes off. I say I'm wearing clothes I took from father's closet (where is he now?). We walk along to the schoolyard still time for Patty and me. She merges herself into my side as we walk up Finn Past the place milk trucks line up to begin. -Stephen Dunning 32 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

From the Fire Comes the Steel

Glowing White hot, Shaped by fire and hammer, The steel is forged, strong and true.

Asoul- Fired in the heat of trials, Hammered by worldly desire, and Tempered through God's mercy Emerges renewed.

Glowing Aflame With the fire of God's love The soul is forged, strong and true. -Lee Anne Errington

Through a Tree at Night

Light shining through a tree and breeze warm and gentle full of luscious spring rocking branches to conceal again and again the beautiful beam that is more than we can know or comprehend.

And though it dissappears from sight beyond the darkened leaves it burns. -Frederick Glaysher A NEW PORTFOLIO OF POEMS 33

Sampler

Cross three threads and no more. The needle Bashes in the firelight; my eyes burn over the stitching as perfect crosses x my way along straight lines of warp and woof inA BC 12 3.

Stitch by stitch the needle pricks my index finger, cultivates a rough garden of white petals growing in pink earth.

There are two windows in the blue embroidery. If I might enter that house, my eyes brown crosses and my hair spiky stitches around my face, I could lie Bat against the linen and look out from those blank windows.

But I am nearly twelve years old. Soon I will sign my work, Elizabeth Jane, A.O. 1837. Soon a man will take me to his house because my neck is graceful over my embroidery frame. -Anne Hutchinson 34 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

Okomotos'

We must go each of us alone, or all together in one big Hiroshima bang, like bushel baskets of Royal Annes toppling off the ladder shelf, cherries flying every which way, our flesh already torn apart by birds, or wormed open, or simply pulled apart by the force of the blast.

Mrs. Okomoto, Mr. Okomoto, you lost sons in the war, do you dream about them? I am that child who watches while you dream, making change, a finger for a toe, an arm, a leg. You pack my mother's groceries neatly in the cardboard box, lettuces, strawberries,

& dahlias. 30 years later you cut the stems a second time to freshen the flowers, wrapping them carefully for me in greengrocer's paper. -Diane L.Jolly A NEW PORTFOLIO OF POEMS 35

Why in the Sun-Tongued Hills

Why in the sun-tongued hills are lambs grown heavy? classed and sorted for the city's slaughtering floor. What sky in the green and gorsed autumn can endure but hourly changes as the clouds sweep their tides around.

It is the month of fast, and fickle winds are one day west and one day gone and one day wet upon the glass apples, bowing to the great god under the grasses.

It is the month of fast, and at the rising of the sun and the going down of the same, I do remember them, the pleasures only partly put away, like old soldiers but brighter in memory, (apple and cinnamon pancakes, with honey) while all the land's adorned and ordered, readied for the winter.

It is the month of fast, and on the lawn button mushrooms push their domed heads, potent as birthing, through the fallen leaves and into the upside world.

It is the month of fast, the light is green and happy in my ribs, I grow as thin as apple leaves. The cloud folds back, the wind leans gently, the sun shines through. -Sen McGlinn 36 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

For the Baha'i Martyrs

Last week in the public square my father was not executed. He doesn't live in Shiraz. He doesn't bolt the door each night, doubtfully, after carefully looking out. When mom goes to bridge group each Thursday night he doesn't worry she might not return or that she will- to a masked terrorist in the garage who will gag and rape her, then drag her out on the lawn, pour kerosene over her, call out for the family, the neighbors to watch. This happens but not to my father. He's white American, a Lutheran, who sells computers and comes home for dinner. -Kim]. Meilicke

Once Dead; Now Dying and we laugh and we cry and we are together while alone and the wind blows the tears from our faces. and we age. -Reinee Pasarow

Versal's New Hip

i. The demonstration today is how she'll walk without pain, miracle of medicine. How without malice they slip through her skin, inserting their instruments, checking the blood flow, temperature, measure leg length, respirate her, fill her chart, trace her heartbeat. Here, they do not notice the stories welling in her, or detect the faint flutter of her right eyelid, drooped since childhood. Here, they design the perfect hip, a bulb of stainless steel chat will fit as if made for her, that will never age. Here, they do not leave open questions on the system of her blood, or the fix of her skeleton. They strive for equalization, close her, measure her response. ii. This old one smiles in her sleep; it is her love for Charlie, the summer of '17, moths steadied on the porch screen; it is World War II, the happy ending, when her and Charlie's boys came back alive; it is the smell of tulips, gabardine, wet towels, stones in her garden, always living near the river. The smile fades, Charlie's gone. But in her anesthetized state, she can do anything: resurrect him, sit in her corner of the couch, read her Bible, ignore the thick plank of smoke from his cigarette, underline favorite passages in ink, scribble notes to her three girls in the margins in the context of her own dying, a word of her own between miracles, Jesus, and Charlie's final breath. -Rebecca Roberts 38 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

Metempsychosis: Sunday Morning

Now it is April. Snow on the trees is tentative like soldiers. Maybe I'll recede into the sun or part of me will, blossoms orbiting.

Cold lunches at the window kept me benumbed. Now it is April, and I'm my own angel, soaring, dropping as the sun does. -Cal E. Rollins A NEW PORTFOLIO OF POEMS 39

Recollecting Jasmine

Since love has focused the heart of my days They are decorated with details and truths That shine more clearly than ever. There are these of you:

The dim light In the two rooms of your simple house Where we were young together, The cool floor smooth with dried dung, The grass mats your family slept on Rolled up neatly against the wall.

We sat on that floor And ate your mother's warm chapatis, Then ran barefoot into sunlight To gather flowers, Make chains for our hair.

When I returned to visit, Worlds and years had come between us But our familiar words held, And you took me back To the bazaar to buy glass bangles, Carefully choosing a lighter blue For my fair arms While yours, slender and brown, Were flattered by deeper shades.

Now, women, and lives apart, Even now I see your smooth round face And black braids with ribbons, Your dark eyes dancing. Where are you? What are the things that shape your days? What do you know about love? -Carolyn Servid 40 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

Childish Things

When they light the candles a little propeller turns the angels around and around.

They are of gold, of thin metal, with a trumpet held in front of each mouth,

And a sound that comes when a tiny chain drags across a silvery chime.

Flecks of light dance on the ceiling from figures that gleam as they pass the flame.

That sight, that sound, that warm candle shine through the years. You look out the window:

What are you doing with the years that shine around and around when the angels come? -William Stafford A NEW PORTFOLIO OF POEMS 41

For The Governor's Inaugural

We have a way-a kind-of life. We want more sky, but we take the days as they become around us-the makings of now, the paths not made. We share a state worth sharing, its dim aisles, its rain-so local, and so all over.

Today again we owe these times our hope. We know one party now-contemporaries, that largest family. We hold our state around us like a coat and count its faults, its wonh, how it can lose, or gain-its light, its darkness . . ..

II.

Last night I heard the wolf again telling God what man has done, and God's great silence received it all so deep and grand that debt was paid. "I am The North; I hear," God said. The moon pouring centuries onto Now made shadows yearn across the snow and distilled from the cold, stunned lakes this call: m.

Be ours, you leaders who guide our state. Remind us in time about tomorrow and the faith our neighbors deserve ofus, also people afar. Help us be worthy-

Be generous. Make the days a gift, this place on Earth, and our part oftime. We turn to you. We offer our trust, faith for faith: be wise for us. - William Stafford 42 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

This is a letter to Rachel Jean Greenough on the occasion of her 18th birthday, February 17, 2001

On the day you were born I was working on a skiff Preparing the wood for water and the Sodden death that water does: The ribs, the skin, sanding, pai nting The season about to begin.

After you were born, It was only four hours after, I saw you And I thought of that skiff And the long waters beyond the rocks. You, of course, were very small and beautiful.

I do not know where you are on this evening Of your 18th birthday. If there are forget-me-nots w here you are I imagine them braided tightly in your hair I imagine you dancing in a long skirt On a beach somewhere, where the water Licks and riffles on your feet. Such gentle water, Rachel, So perfect.

Thousands of years ago The Vikings launched their dead in ships And burned them. The women would sing from the shore, The boats burned to the water line, Then hissing, sank below the surface.

You and I are separated now, have lost touch, But listen, listen for the voices of those women. A greater silence than thought has followed them, And I am out beyond the rocks In my small skiff, Watching you dance on the sand Laughing myself to see you still So beautiful. A NEW PORTFOLIO OF POEMS 43

Remember Rachel that on the day you were born I was the first man, not of your blood To love you, And even though there is so much water And as many rocks as stars in the darkness That love is as perfect As the songs on the shore. Even if the singers have lost touch Or are gone, Their voices are still strong. -John Straley 44 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

Hawaiian Fireside

The wind of the Spirit blows free in this place of mingling cultures and races. A Fiji Islander sings his calypso the echoes filling the room with sound. Questions and answers, a dialogue of light spills over the seekers. Now the Martyrs' song in Farsi quickens the hearts, as tears of sorrow and joy combine to wipe away the last remnants of materialism

A wondrous grace floods the peoples of the world, as they look into one another's eyes and see oneness. What matters the color, the culture, the flowers are in one garden now and the brilliant varied colored lights illuminate the night, and the trade winds flow through the open window and the red sun falls into the sea. -Joan Imig Taylor

Possession

Love has not done with us Though we thought it tamed, Docile to our tether, Meek, possessed and named.

Pecking from our lax palm Who'd guess this mild, owned thing In frenzy might elude us On wild violent wing?

It was Love had caged us In inattentive pride; Unchecked, now stalks the dark wood Where we blindly ride.

Love has not done with us, Not yet, heart, not yet. It rages to subdue us, Will have us for pet. -Roger White A NEW PORTFOLIO OF POEMS 45

The Caving Grounds

:My husband tries to frighten me with stories about the Upper Peninsula where German spies photographed the Negaunee hotel while pretending to be circus performers, sword swallowers and acrobats, photographing the lumber yards, Black River falls, White Mountain, and the caving grounds where his grandma's neighbor may have been murdered, angry at her husband's neglect deciding to walk home by the caving grounds instead of caking his pick-up truck- perhaps seeing a willow instead of barbed wire her throat a red Bower in an ordinary housedress. frightening me with stories about her still walking the caving grounds as real as the Albino Women, the Gorgons, who appear to me each night . When I ask what they want, each turns into snakes; as real as the quilt patches that waver like an aurora borealis that I saw for the first time; as real as Hunerites wearing polka dot dresses.

I don't need anyone to frighten me I still want the house near the mining location where the lakes underneath support the frame, though the water may appear like the water of my eye; though her body may float under me even as I sleep, a roseate fan. - JanZerfas 46 WORLD ORDER: SUMMER 1983

Authors & Artists

ELLIOT ABHAU is a poet. of his poems: Handfuls of Us (1979), Walking Home Dead (1981), and Do You T OM ANDREWS is a senior at Hope Col Fear No One (1982). lege, Holland, Michigan, where he is ma joring in English and philosophy. LEE ANNE ERRINGTON holds an associ ate degree in social work and now works LYNN ANN ASCRIZZI, a senior editor of as a secretary. Farmstead Magazine, has published many articles on home gardening and wood FREDER1CK GLAYSHER holds a Master's heat. degree in English language and literature from the University of Michigan, the DICK BARNES is a professor of E nglish at University Press of which has accepted Pomona College in Claremont, Califor for publication his edition of The Collect· nia. His publications include articles, po· ed Prose of Robert Hayden. His review of etry, and translations. He plays and sings Gerald Graff's Literature Against Itselfap with the Real Time Jazz Band. peared in our Spring 1983 issue.

THERESE BECKER is a poet, freelance ANNE HUTCHINSON is on the editorial journalist, and a photojournalist who is board of Moving Out, a feminist literary working on a degree at Oakland Univer and arts journal. sity in Michigan. DIANE JOLLY, a partner in Bleything & BRET BRENEMAN is an En glish instruc Jolly Writing, has had her poems pub tor at the University of H awaii College lished in Dog River Review, Moose Maga of Continuing Education. zine, and College English.

JOYCE ANTHONY CALDWELL is a free SEN MCGLINN, a native of New Zealand, lance writer and painter and the presi published Dawn Dreams in 1973. He dent of the Lake Land Arts Association , lives on a small yacht that haunts the Burt, New York, which she helped form. small harbors of H auraki Gulf.

D ANIEL CALTO is a student and carpen KIM J . MEILICKE is an assistant editor for ter. Naturegraph Publishers.

DRUZELLE CEDERQUIST teaches English R£INEE PASAROW, having published two as a second language at the Zaria's Chil articles on the near-death experience, is dren's School in Nigeria. now working on her first novel.

STEPHEN DUNNING is a professor of ROSEY E. POOL, who was born in Hol English at the University of Michigan. land, discovered the poetry of Countee He has written and edited numerous Cullen in 1925 and began a long-time in texts for school children and college stu terest in American Negro poetry. She en dents and has published three chapbooks couraged an interest in Afro-American 47

poetry in Paul Breman, who published Some Day, Maybe; Stories That Could Be her first anthology of Negro poetry (/ TrtJ-e; A Glass Face in the Rain (all from Saw How Black I Was) and Robert Hay Harper and Row); Things That Happen den's Ballad of Remembrance (in 1962). Where There Aren't Any People (BOA Pool published a second anthology of Publications); and Sometimes Like a Negro poetry in 1962-Beyond the Legend (Copper Canyon Press). Blues-and she made the first English translation of the diary of her now-fam JOHN STRALEY works with the U.S. For ous student, Anne Frank, an account of est Service. which appeared in World Order's Spring 1972 issue. JOAN IMIG TAYLOR has published her poems in a variety of poetry magazines, REBECCA ROBERTS is a freelance journal university quarterlies, and children's ist who has had her poetry published in magazines. She is a frequent contributor The Beloit Poetry journal and Passages to World Order. Northwest. JUNE MANNING THOMAS is an associate CALE. ROLLINS has taught creative writ professor at Michigan State University ing at the Institute of American Indian with a joint appointment in the urban Ans in Sama Fe and was for a year the planning and urban affairs program. She poet-in-residence for the New Mexico has published articles on the effects of Poets-in-the-Schools Program. A fre tourism and land development in South quent contributor to World Order, he has Carolina, urban displacement, and racial had his poems published in a variety of discrimination and urban minorities. poetry magazines. ROGER WHITE, a native of Canada now CAROLINE SERVID teaches pan time at Is living in Israel, is a writer, artist, and land Community College, Sitka, Arkan craftsman of many talents. He has had sas, an~ cohosts a half-hour weekly radio two volumes of poetry published: An· show on poetry. Two of her poems ap other Song, Another Season and The Wit peared in Loonl.ark: The Orea Anthology ness ofPebbles. ofPoetry and Prose. )AN ZERFAS is an instructor at Lansing WILLIAM STAFFORD, Professor Emeritus (Michigan) Community College and as at Lewis and Clark College in Oregon, sociate editor of Labyris, a feminist small was in 1974 named Poet Laureate of the press magazme. State of Oregon and in 1970-71 served as • consultant in poetry at the Library of ART CREDITS: Cover, design by John So Congress. He has also been honored with larz, photograph by Leonora Cetone Starr; pp. 1, 3, photographs by Delton Baerwolf; p. a National Book Award and a Guggen 7, photograph by Grace Nielsen; pp. 8, 18, heim Fellowship. His many collections photographs by Delton Baerwoli; p. 23, pho of poems include Traveling Through the tograph by Joan Miller; pp. 24, 48, photo Dark; The Rescued Years; Allegiances; graphs by Delton Baerwolf.