این دو سال ِ لعنتی

تو

همواره زیبای ِ سرزمینم

می گویند

مو در آسیاب سپید نکرده ها را می گویم

می گویند روزی او خواهی شد

آن چنان او

و آن قدر دور از تو

که ما دیگر خواب تو را نمی بینیم

کابوس های بی حضور ِ تو

و فریاد های ِ شبانه هر از گاهمان ، پیش کش

این "تو" تا "او" شود

من مرده ام

تو می گویند

آن قدر دور از تو می شوی

که از یاد ِ شعر ها خالی

و گربه ها

گربه هادیگر

به بهانه کاسه ای شیر هم

برایت میو میو خرد نمی کنند

این "تو" تا "او" شود

من مرده ام

تو

همواره شاعر جهان

می گویند

جهان دیده و گشته ها را می گویم

روزی آن چنان او می شوی

که خیال های تازه از غم پریده مان

خالی از سراغ ِ نشانه های ِ ابراهیم گشتن می شود

از این "تو" می گویند

از آن "او"

و این "تو" تا "او" شود

من مرده ام

از من می گویند

غربت دیده ها را می گویم

که من دوباره دلم

خالی از هوس خواب و خیال تو می شود

ولی این "تو" تا "او" شود

من مرده ام

از این 'تو" می گویند

از ‌آن "او" و "من"

من توی ِ او را نمی خواهم

من ِ بی تو را هم

فقط دلم

قسم به شعرهای ِ تو و کتاب های ِ خواب خورده ات

دلم من

فراموشی ِ این دو سال را می طلبد.

Redress and Camilleri's Red Dress + a Comment on Meghan's Post

Back to last week's discussion about Camilleri's I Am a Red Dress, to be honest, when Helen brought up the connection between the text and the word "redress", I didn't know what the word mean (don't blame me, try learning your fourth language at the age of 23), and I didn't ask not because I am shy, but ironically, at ten oclock in the morning, it is usually very late for me to speak or quesion since I go to bed after our class. Anyway, after I looked up the meaning of the word "redress" and finished reading the book, I totally got Helen's point and what she wanted us to notice.

Very cliche of me, I know, but I have to state this for the sake of my post; the Oxford dictionary defines redress as: remedy or setting right an undesirable or unfair situation.

By writing about her childhood experience, either completely true or not, and letting her readers know that although something has been taken away from her (her innocence for example) and although she has been exposed to a strange sexual experience, which harms a lot of people for their whole life, Camilleri has gained something or many other perspectives on a lot of other life experinces on the other hand. While there is no way of legitimizing or validating the detrimental effects of sexual abuse, particularly for a person at an early age, Camilleri has learned to resist, and to break away from the cycle in which her mother and her grandmother were stuck. Her mother, despite being a tough and powerful woman, who actually dreams of putting on a red dress and going to her father's funeral (imagine doing or even saying such a statement in an Italian family; in Italian culture, respecing a dead person is so important that wearing black is actually mandatory for funeral ceremony, even for your enemies) is silent with the grandfather and cannot confront him. She states for instance:

"For all of my mother's toughness and defiance, I never saw her stand up to my grandfather, but as soon as he left the room she yelled out, "When that bastard dies, I'm going to the funeral in a red dress." Afterward, she looked sad, melancholic" (p. 74).

And now, Anna Camilleri, breaks that silence by writing about it, by not being ashamed of her body, her childhood body that was distrubed and her childhood mind that was interrupted by her grandfather's touchings and sexual assaults. She does in fact states that she has been able to save some sort of sexual pleasure for herself with her method of giving herself an orgasim right after her grandfather's assaults. I remember someone in class saying that she does not believe Anna going through such experiences, but I do believe her and I admire her and envy her for her brilliance and her courage. It takes a smart person, especially at that age, to come up with a way of savign a pleasure that would last for her whole life. Even if she is not telling the true personal experience as it has happened, it is very creative and smart of her to develope such a story.

Instead of letting her experience to ruin her emotions, her future, and her whole life, Camilleri has come up with a remedy to heal the damage or the harm done to her. She introduces her readers to a new way of thinking about their past experiences and I can see and understand how her way of setting things right for her mind and her emotions might be the best way of dealing with experiences like hers.

Although unless someone is sexulaly abused as a child, it is completely unimaginable to see such an experience from her/his/hir perspective and understand and conceptualize it to the degree that that person does, as I said before, I can see what she is trying to do, maybe not just for her readers but also for her own sanity. For example, in my last post, I talked about some aspects of my own childhood and how my mother used to make my sisters and I think that a woman's body can be touched and a female mind can be distracted as a result of an inappropriate touching, but it was still a woman's responsibility to either avoid or welcome such (almost always) unwelcomed and repulsive touchings, rubbings, leering, and flirting. Few hours later, someone commented on my post and was surprised at how I can hear such statements from my mother and for my whole childhood and adolescence and not hate men. I have no intention of comparing myself or my experience to Camilleri's, but I think I acted and reacted similarly to Camilleri when I did not let my experiences with men backhome ruin my future relationships with the man I fell in love with. I don't want to say that seeing those kind of men made me appreciate the man I love because I don't love my partner for the lack of potential harms he can do to me but for the qualities he has and the features that he doesn't, not the damaging features he can be capable of having or showing ( I hope I am articulating this right) but knowing that he was raised among the men who touched me and many others like me, I now know that it also takes a strong and smart person to avoid the traditional views on women and a loveable personality to deconstruct and reconstruct the values your were suposed to cherish. Instead of hating every man I came across, I was able to put aside my negative past experiences with men, and decide if I was going to be enjoy the presence of the one I fell in love with in my life.


Cheers,
Roghiyeh