Da (Mother) 54

The Memoirs of Seyyedeh Zahra Hoseyni

Seyyedeh Zahra Hoseyni
Translated from the Persian with an Introduction by Paul Sprachman

2023-7-19

Da (Mother)

The Memoirs of Seyyedeh Zahra Hoseyni

Seyyedeh Zahra Hoseyni

Translated from the Persian with an Introduction by Paul Sprachman

Persian Version (2008)

Sooreh Mehr Publishing House

English Version (2014)

Mazda Publishers

***

I looked around and noticed two piles of sand by the yard. I walked to them and rubbed my hands with sand. Then I wiped them off on the earth in the yard. Abdollah followed suit but used more force than I did in trying to rub his hands clean. I got the bloodstains off, but I wasn’t satisfied with my efforts. So I went back to the mill and wiped my hands on the bricks; they felt heavy as if they weren’t part of my body. Then I left the mill.

As we walked Abdollah and I were strangely quiet. I continued to rub my hands in the dirt by the road. Abdollah did the same.

The further we went, the more the enemy fire intensified, which offered a distraction from the horror of touching the old man’s corpse. To take Abdollah’s mind off it, I said, “You see where the shells are landing?”

He grumbled in Arabic, “I’m not going with you anymore. I’m going back to the mosque.” Then he added in Persian, “We were supposed to go and have breakfast.”

“Well, did I stop you?”

“No, but you went after corpses. My nerves can’t take any more of this. I’m never going to handle dead people again.”

“So don’t,” I said. “Who said you have to? This is what I do. That’s why I stayed in the city.” He said nothing.

We continued to walk in silence, but after a while, realizing I was angry at him, he asked, “What are you going to do when we get to the mosque: stay or go?”

“I don’t know. We’’ll see what happens.”

It was clear that he wanted to have a heart-to-heart. “Look, sister, this one was really messed up, don’t you think?”

“Yes, he was, but there was no need to say so.”

We left Ordibehesht Street and entered Forty-Meter Road. The Iraqis were now targeting the center of the city. Every twenty meters along the road our forces had set up sandbag emplacements: in front of the Quran school, the Imam Sadeq Mosque, on the corner of Forty-Meter and Revolution, which led to the Congregational Mosque.

Along the curbs the sandbags were piled in semicircles, but the emplacements in the roads were fully circular and surrounded by trenches. The shelling destroyed the houses that had remained standing after the first assault. The trees along the avenue were scorched and the city looked even more deserted. We passed several soldiers sleeping in their emplacements; they had obviously been on post all night. The expressions on their faces said one thing: exhaustion.

Before I reached the Quran School, I said hello to the girls who were nearby. The school had been designated as a backup post. Several times when I had passed the school, I had seen them fortifying it.

The first person to answer my greeting was Shahnaz Hajjishah, who was perched on a sandbag. As I got nearer, I said hello to Fakhri Taqati and Mrs. Abedi, the principal. They were sitting on the ground with their backs against the sandbags. “What’s the latest?” I asked.

“You’re the one who’s going around all the time, and you’re asking us? We’re just waiting for someone to let us know.”

I laughed and said, “Well, you’ve certainly made a nice foxhole for yourselves.”

“Yeah. Now, you tell us what’s the latest?” they asked cheerfully.

“No news, as usual. We’ve collected a few bodies and sent them to Jannatabad.” Then I gave them a brief description of how the old man at the mill was killed. Everyone was moved. Mrs. Abedi sent up a prayer for me. Then Shahnaz said with a smile, “You’re the one who’s working; we’re just happy to look busy.”

“Isn’t that something? Just sticking around and doing what you can—What else it there?”

As we spoke, some of the remote areas of the city were being bombarded. But when I said goodbye and headed for the mosque, they started to shell Forty-Meter Road harder.

I found Zohreh Farhadi and Maryam Amjadi sitting on the front steps of the mosque, following the progress of the shelling. I said hello and went inside. Everybody at the infirmary expected a shell to hit the mosque at any time. After the usual greetings, I said, “What’s he up to? The shells have been dogging my steps ever since I left Jannatabad.”

The sounds of explosions drowned out their answers. The shells were getting closer, and bombs were landing nearby. The whine of rockets and the roar of the blasts seemed to be coming from from all directions at once, and the smell of smoke and cordite filled the air. I ran outside, but no sooner had I gotten to the bottom steps of the mosque and before I could reach the street, the ground beneath my feet jerked. A terrible blast knocked the wind out of me, and the shock wave propelled me a few feet. At the same time several people were knocked to the ground at the crossroads. I caught a glimpse of one of them just before the blast. He was middle-aged and dressed in brown pants and a grey shirt. I wanted to go and see to the wounded but thought I should let the people at the infirmary know what had happened first. I rushed inside and said, “Move it! There are wounded outside.”

I didn’t waste a second and ran back. Although my ears were ringing from the explosion, I could hear people murmuring pathetically as they stood beside the wounded. One of them announced, “Help is on the way.”

I began to examine them. Besides being wounded by shrapnel, they had been slammed to the ground by the shock wave. They didn’t respond to anything we said but merely lay limp and lifeless on the ground, which had been furrowed by pieces of shell casing and shrapnel. The man that I had seen running before the blast was covered head to foot in blood. His eyes were open and he stared into space without blinking. I went over to him and said, “Do you hear my voice? Are you alive?”

He didn’t respond. I quickly took his pulse. It was very weak. Mr. Najjar came by and said, “He’s alive but he’s had a very bad shock.” His condition was worse than the others. There was shrapnel in his legs and stomach, and the wounds were bleeding heavily. People helped us bring the wounded into the mosque so we could give them first aid until a vehicle arrived. Then we sent them to the Mosaddeq Hospital.

When I left the hospital from the emergency room, I saw two of the girls who had been helping at the mosque running around frantically. I don’t recall their names now, but they said, “Have you heard? Two of the girls from the school were killed.”

“NO! When?” I said.

“A few hours ago, in front of the school.”

In shock I said, “That was when I was there, but there was nothing going on then.”

“If you don’t believe us, go to the morgue and see for yourself.”

I didn’t waste a minute and headed for the bulky gate that opened onto the yard. There was a pickup parked in front. I entered the building and saw Sabah Vatankhah, who worked mainly in the mosque infirmary. She was staring into space. I walked by her and my nose was greeted by the stench of blood.

Shafts of light from the open door penetrated the darkness inside, making the job of identifying the corpses easier. The stone floor was littered with bodies dressed in tattered clothing and scarred by deep wounds. Blood and water from the melting blocks of ice flowed over the floor. Some of the corpses were still on stretchers, which meant that they were so mutilated that the attendants didn’t dare lay them on the ground. People circled the bodies looking for their loved ones and wailing. Other people were busy trying to put the corpses into some kind of order. It was hard to make out the faces of the girls of the school among the mass of bodies. Already reeling from the blast, I got dizzier from turning this way and that. The buzzing in my ears was still there.

I remembered the instant of the blast in detail: how people seemed to fall to the ground like so many leaves, how shards of metal from the bomb dug into the asphalt, and how shrapnel burrowed into the earth for a considerable distance in all directions. I was replaying the scene in my mind, when I heard someone behind me say, “Come, the two Shahnazes are over here.” I turned around and saw the face of a woman, bright in the darkness. “Weren’t you the one who was looking for the girls at the school?” she repeated.

Then she pointed to two bodies near me. I couldn’t believe it. Shahnaz Hajjishah? Without knowing it, I stepped away from her body I didn’t have the heart to look at her in that condition. Her white tunic was blood-soaked and her chador was wrapped around her body. My head started reeling as I looked around and kept repeating to myself, “Never! Never!”

I bent down to look at her hoping it was a mistake. There was no mistaking the look of kindness on her face. I looked more closely; it was as if her face was radiant. She also had a look of satisfaction, almost delight—no sign of pain or suffering. I adjusted her dark blue headscarf so it would cover her hair, which was matted with blood. Given how much she prized her dignity when she was alive, the last thing I wanted was for her to lose it now. I looked at the face next to hers, which was less familiar; I only knew her name: Shahnaz Mohammadi, one of the girls at the school. I looked at Shahnaz Hajjishah again. We had become friends during the first days of the war. After father’s death, we became closer. Whenever we saw each other, however briefly, we would always pour out our hearts or offer comfort by joking or saying a few words. I started to cry silently. A painful lump had formed in my throat. If I had only stayed a bit longer at the school, I could have gotten my wish. I could have joined father. Why didn’t I stay longer?

I looked at her through a film of tears, wishing it wasn’t so. Why did it have to be Shahnaz? I was so fond of her. I knelt and cradled her head in my arms. Even though death had become an ordinary thing for me, I still couldn’t believe she was dead, and the more I looked at her, the less her death seemed real. I lay her head back on the ground and began to shake uncontrollably. I rose and turned away feeling horrible. Unaware of the time, I didn’t notice that Mahmud Farrokhi and several others had entered the morgue. The girls went over to the Shahnazes and cried. I heard Mahmud say, “We want to take the bodies.”

A man came with stretchers and called on the girls to help.

Looking for someone to help us, I saw Sabah Vatankhah’s mother there, which was strange because she normally worked at the mosque kitchen.

I called out to her, “Come and take her head.”

To be continued …