Source: http://dargolestane.blogfa.com/post-409.aspx blog in Farsi language this translation provided by N.Afarin. Questions & connection to the volunteers of solidarity with the mothers in mourning in Iran: margebarmostabed@gmail.com
Lest we become one of them
Look at these pictures, yesterday when I saw the second picture it reminded me of the first one. The painting “the Intervention of the Sabine Women” is my favorite picture. I love it something awful. It’s an oil paining by Jacques-Louis David, the French painter, painted around the year 1795. I mean around the years of rein of terror, & when France was in war with other countries in Europe. David was imprisoned because of siding with Robespierre. After his wife, bereft of all hope, visited him in prison, David thought of painting this to give her heart that love conquers over conflict.
Whenever I look at this picture, among all the chaos & action, what captures my eye is “Hersilia” with her golden locks & her white robe & stony face. As the story goes, Romulus & his men founded the city of Rome, & did not have any women among them so they went to the neighboring Sabines to ask permission to intermarry. The men of Sabine didn’t grant them permission & the Roman men invited the Sabines to Rome for a celebration & in the midst of celebration, abducted the women & drove out the men of Sabine. These women had children by the Romans & many years after the Sabines attacked the Romans in revenge. The Sabine women stood in the middle & made the two sides make peace. In David’s painting you see Hersilia, Romulus’s wife & daughter of the king of the Sabines, she stands between her husband & her father.

I think something like this happened in 1979, the revolution was a celebration that beguiled the feminine presence in my country, abducted it & swallowed it up. It was blind & ignorant, as usual, & didn’t realize this is an eternal force, it can be dormant but will never disappear; it will wait & spring back from somewhere. Somewhere in the midst of the second picture. In this picture I see Hersilia who is fed up with the blood & war of men & is demanding peace. That is why I say this movement will not be moved to violence as long as this woman stands in the midst.
This woman has experienced being abducted & deceived & will not repeat the mistake of 1979, will not throw stones, shed blood, will not become a guerrilla fighter, take up arms, will not acquiesce to the feast of violence. This woman with the luminous arms & radiance of her hair will make my country green.
I know you know what I mean when I say woman, its not just women I speak of, I speak of the feminine presence, the power that drives this movement, the power that comes of wisdom, kindness, resilience, temperance & brave hearted motherhood that will put a smile on the faces of the men of my country & hijab on their heads.
I speak of Sohraab & his mother. I speak of the youngster who slept in his bed two nights ago, was in detention last night, & I know not where tonight. I speak of the anger that blazed in me as I spoke to his mother & my struggle to make hope & patience of that anger so as not to lose myself, so as not to become one of them.
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refers to the political action the week before the ashura uprising (first week of December); 16 of azar in the Iranian calendar, commemoration of the student rally of 1953, swept the country this year, largely organized & initiated by left leaning students. masses of students came out in support. It refers to the incident involving a student leader, Majid Tavakoli, who was detained after making a brave & fiery speech. the establishment attempted a smear campaign & to shame him & announced he was fleeing the scene with women’s clothes, released a picture of him in the state run media in women’s clothes & hijab, in response a peoples campaign started, men took pictures with women’s clothes & hijab. It was largely interpreted as an action in solidarity with both the student leader, & women in Iran, who forcibly have to wear the hijab in public, restoring a sense of dignity to both.
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/12/09/irans-state-media-mocks-arrested-student-leader-pictured-in-womens-clothing/
http://www.irannewsdigest.com/2009/12/18/majid-tavakolis-full-speech-the-hejab-campaign/