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Bring me back the meaning of my life

This is an English translation of a love letter written for Mostafa Tajzadeh by his wife, while he’s in thenotorious Evin prison and said to be under torture after the Iranian presidential elections in June 2009.A note to consider before reading this love letter from Fakhrosadat to Mostafa:Mostafa and Fakhrosadat were close to the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of the IslamicRevolution of Iran. Like many other supporters of Khomeini, they supported the Islamic revolution withgood intentions and in recent years they have supported the pro-democracy reform movement in Iran,and are thus considered opposition for the hardliners such as Ahmadinejad. It is worth noting thatKhomeini himself was weary of the damage these hardliners could do and did not allow them to thrivewhile he was alive.My dear, my sweetheart, my darlingI didn’t fall in love with your looks when I was seventeen, though beautiful they were and still are.Because in the two meetings we had when you proposed, we didn’t even remember that fondness waswhat our mothers and grandmothers said it’s supposed to beAnd I didn’t fall in love with your riches as you told me the first day that you had none, none at all, andyou told me in later days “because I don’t want to lie, I should say out of everything in this world, I havea motorcycle” and I frowned because the thought of motorcycle riding was not beautiful in my mind andI preferred to walk on foot and be lateAnd I didn’t fall in love with your ranks as you had none. You said “I am in the Islamic RevolutionCommittee, and in the Friday prayers staff”, and I didn’t care at all what you do.Honey, I fell in love with your character, and I chose you for your own name “Mostafa” (the chosen one)and you became

chosen one. I, Fakhrosadat, was the baby of the family and everybody was waitingto see who the last groom of our family will be and your brother-in-law told me the day after youproposed “It was as clear as day that you were going to like this guy”I don’t know why he said that but I liked you because you were the man of my dreams in 1981, exactlytwo years after the victory of the Islamic Revolution. Me, a seventeen year old Fakhrosadat, a fieryrevolutionary who cared not for the musts and must-nots that were determined by the norm. I wantedyou who wanted nothing other than the ideals and beliefs that were my ideal and belief. And you lovedRuhollah who coupled us together forever, and I want you who are still standing for the ideals you hadthen.

Oh my partner in life, stay strong for your ideals and know that I’m always proud of you and yourperseverance.You were in a rush for us to get married and I too, and we both insisted that our mentor and leadermust solemnize our marriage. We decided that both our families would try to reserve a time with thelate Imam. You through Mr. Khamenei and us through Mr. Mohtashamipour who Imam loved like heloved his children Mostafa and Ahmad and everybody knew that. I don’t remember which time camefirst, but on January 27, 1981 we were together on our way to Jamaran for an eternal bond. Youremember, I know you remember well, and I still remember your face full of tears in the hands of theImam, and my own tears, and my own tears, and my own tearsI announced my marriage portion to be a series of the Tafsir al-Mizan and the Imam asked me todetermine some money too and I told him to do as he saw fit, and he asked if I knew how to use theTafsir and I knew, and after a silence he said the vows and I was in a hurry to say “I do” and me and youhad no care for where we were and what conditions we had as though we were spellbound. And theImam told us to tolerate each other and he told me to tolerate my husband and you to tolerate yourwife so we learned that intolerance is a possibility in people’s lives, and we decided to forever keep thepromise we made in front of the Imam and we tolerated each other and the problems of life and its upsand downs and its sweet and sours, but we could never tolerate one instance of separation and nowyou’ve just taken your path and gone away?????????????? No they took your path and they took youaway my chosen one This was not what we had promised. Do you remember every time wetalked about you going to war I would get nervous and you would tell me not to worry for martyrdomrequires a grace that not just any guy can achieve, and every time you heard the news of a dear onebeing martyred, you would get mesmerised and possessed, and when news came that Mohsen had risento heaven and Hossein had been captured how you treated the families of these cousins so that theywould forget the pain of the loss of their children when they smelled your presence and saw all yourkindness and compassion, my sweetheartDo you remember the home we had rented was filled with pictures of martyrs? From Rajayi andBahonar and Beheshti and Motahhari, to all the relatives and friends who were martyred, and everyonesaid is this a house or a museum of martyrs? And in one of the last times we moved you cleaned most of the picture frames really well you put them in a box and said their respect must be kept and we tooktheir memories to the depth of our hearts to keep them safe from any harm, and... do you remember allthose pictures were smiling except the one of the Imam but we liked the charisma?I hear in their home to home searches they seize the picture albums, and I’m so glad that you hid thosepictures from evil eyes and took them away from dirty handsI have so much to talk to you about. I don’t know if you’ve heard my voice in these 18 days of division.They say you only hear the “Allah-u-Akbar” chants. I wish our house was still in Sa’adat Abad so youcould hear my voice from section 209 in Evin which they say is newly built like the house that was neverbuilt for you and for us, and you would say “Fakhri, our lives are coming to an end”, and I would say I

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Bring Me Back the Meaning of My Life

English translation of a love letter written for Mostafa Tajzadeh by his wife, while he’s in the notorious Evin prison and said to be under torture after the Iranian presidentia... (More)

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