WVU Iranian Student Association

1) Pictures:
You are invited to see some pictures of our beautiful country. Please click on the pictures if you want to see them in actual size.
Note: Some pictures may be copyrighted. Please communicate with one of the officers for more information.

Pictures

2) Ancient Persian Studies:
Dr. Kaveh Farrokh in his website provides documented information on the Advancement of Ancient Iranian and Classical Studies. The relationship between ancient Iran and the civilizations of the Greco-Roman world (and its European successors), the Arabo-Islamic world, India, China and the Far East are a major focus of the website.
We invite interested people to read the web pages and let us know if they have any question or require further materials to study.

YOU I LOVE, THE OLD NATIVE LAND

In the vain world, if I love anything,
you, the old native land, I love.
You, the ancient, eternal, young
you I love, if I love.
You, precious, ancient Iran,
you the dear jewel, I love.
You, the ancient homeland of the great,
the great-creator, I love.
Art-like your thought shines
and I love both your art and thought.
If the saying of saga, or the text of history
and if the critique and narration of behaviors, I love.
If the pen is chisel and writings inscribed in stone
on the sheet of mountain and rock, I love.
If recorded in book with black ink
by reed or feather pen, I love.
Your supposition I praise with certainty,
your obviousness, I love like news.
Both your Ormazd and your gods, I worship,
as well Farrah and Frwahar, I love.
Most heartily, your old innocent prophet
who is a clear-sighted preceptor, I love.
The precious Zoroaster, more than
any preceptor and prophet, I love.
Mankind did not and will not see better than him.
I love the best in the mankind.
His three goods are best guide to the world
useful so short, I love.
The Iranian superman was leader.
I love the Iranian leader who
did not kill nor order any one to kill,
thus I love him so much.
That veracious preceptor, though he went
farther up than saga, I love.
Your vigilant son, Bamdad
the Nishaborian, sun-glory, I love.
Magnificence Mazdak, the immortal intellect of eras,
him I love, every look and aspect.
Bravely, he died in the in the war against injustice,
more as a result of this, I love him.
Praising your respected Mani
as a painter and a prophet, I love him.
Both portritor of superior souls
and Arzhang the painter, I love.
Your entire farmer day and irrigated farming
in the field and plain and by brook and stream, I love.
Your deserts like the sea and your mountain like the forest,
the whole country, wet and dry, I love.
Your devotee and sagacious martyrs
who was the honor of mankind, I love.
Like the pleasure of dawn breeze their souls
their mettlesome iron-liver, I love.
Both their exciting thoughts, which
turned upside down the eras,
And their works, either exhortation or message,
and if some rows new, I love.
I love the men of everlasting-memory, of whom
there were several in every century.
All your poets and their works,
like the purity of down’s breeze, I love.
From Ferdowsi, the saga palace which was raised
in the horizons of glory and triumph, I love.
From Khayyam, the wrath and roar which
affects the heart and soul, I love.
From Attar, that agony and passion
which was set on fire in heat and soul, I love.
From the Enamoured of Shams, the boiling and spark
which flame the soul, I love.
From Sadi, from Hafez and from Nezami
all passion, poet and byword, I love.
How good your Rasht, Gorgan and Mazanderan
I love them, like the Caspian Sea.
How good the river basin of Karun and Ahvaz,
which I love more sweetly than sugar.
Happy your great Azerbaijan
I love that vanguard of danger.
Your Esfahan, the half of the world
I love more than the other half.
Good for the best-fosterer region, Khorasan,
with all my heart, I love that expanse.
Well done, your Shiraz the paradise-level,
the cradle of talent and art, I love.
Your Kurd’s and Baluch’s territory
the dencency-fruit tree, I love.
Good for your Kerman and southern frontier
the dry and wet, sea and land, I love.
I love our co-origin Afghan, which is a garden
in the claws of these worse than Tattars, I love.
The old Indus and Khwarazm, with its desert
which the Qajar dynasty lost them, I love.
Your Irak and Gulf like the Varazd River
which is the gate of the Chinese Wall, I love.
Both our old Armenia and Caucasian,
like a son the father’s house, I love.
Your yesterday, like saga, and tomorrow dream
most willingly the former and the latter, I love.
Both your saga which better than children
raises me on wing and plumage, I love.
And your dreamy horizons, that permanently
travel in dream’s horizon, I love.
Like dream and saga, your yesterday and tomorrow
instead of myself, I love these two.
But between these two, o’ thou alive, to present
still today, I love more.
You were in the apogee, both in meaning and form.
I love the apogee of glory and peril.
Once again raise to the apogee of meaning,
for you these new colors and faces, I love.
To become Eastern, Western or Arabic
for you, I do not like the native land.
So long as the world exists, may you be triumphant!
may you be growing, vigilant and prosperous!

Taken from “An Annotated Contemporary Persian Poetry”,
by Ahad Ghorbani

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