contributed photo

I’ve been in mourning ever since I first read about the bombing of the primary girls’ school in Minab, Iran. That bombing on February 28, killed every single one of those girls and their teachers. 

Maybe, in some instances, war can be necessary. But I think, in this instance, it’s completely unnecessary, and it showed itself that way when those girls died.

I started to think about what it would be like to be in Tehran, in a place where bombs are hitting my neighbors… I don’t know where my loved ones are… yesterday I was able to go to the store and get what I need, and today I have to cross pathways of rubble, seeing and hearing and walking through all the aftermath of the bombings. 

What would it be like to send my husband Mike off to go fight in Iran, whether we have protested our government or not? Would he come home? How many Iranian people are not coming home, whether they protested their government or are in the military? What are the real reasons for it — power and greed and control? 

I’ve been grieving into that mirror here, and also the same mirror in Tehran. And the one sentiment that feels true on both sides of that glass is, please come home. That’s what we all say to our loved ones, to our friends, when they leave us: we will see you next time, or please call me when you get home, text me when you get home. 

Please come home is the shared humanity, the relationships, the connection. 

Please Come Home (Rubble)

All alone
Please come home
To Tehran To New Haven
Please come home.

So much smoke
No way to see
If you’re okay
Or the real reason
You had to go
They had to come
Which side of the mirror
Are you on

Still you shine–
Your love is truth
Tears can’t hide
I miss you
They miss them too
Look what this world
Puts us through

You sacrifice
So I can be
Can they also be free
Fighting for lives
We are meant to lead.

The silence– so loud
Rubble all around
Chaos falls like snow
Covering what we know
So cold so cold so cold
We want peace
They want peace
Life that’s free

Be bold!
Signal out my name
I will sing you back into my arms,
Away from greed games

All alone
Please come home
To Tehran To New Haven
Please come home.

I am so sad to see how the U.S. is once again becoming a joke to the rest of the world. About 20 years ago, when the U.S. decided to go into Iraq, I was a student at Southern, and went abroad to study in England and then Holland. I was a journalism major, and I was writing about the problems with the stated reasons for that war. A teacher who was a U.S. military veteran criticized me for the work, saying “you’ve got to do your duty for your country.”

Isn’t writing about what’s happening in my country a civic duty as well? (As it turns out, in another unsettling parallel, he also was a sexual predator.) 

Other students in England literally told me every day that “your country is a joke to us right now.” They weren’t calling me a joke, but still — I very quickly got that being from the U.S. abroad was not a good look. Later, studying in Holland, I was told “the United States sucks… what’s up with KFC, their buildings are ugly, why do people talk like that,” going on and on about how terrible America is.

 I was the only student from the United States; everybody else was from Europe, except for one student who was from Russia. Everyone would look at me like I was the U.S. ambassador. I have never experienced that kind of other-ization and discrimination — and from my own classmates.

The only two who showed me grace were my Russian classmate, and a Dutch classmate who stepped up for me when things got desperate. To this day, every time I think of them, I send each light and love – they were real.

We were each supposed to create a presentation about our country and culture. I never did it, but I can still remember my Russian classmate’s presentation. There were family photos, the history of where she lived, and then it went into an anti-Putin protest, and they stopped her. I wanted to hear more, thinking how I never get to hear from people in real life — so different from what’s on the news. 

I moved away from journalism, realizing that the media is coming from a slant that is serving a bottom line and a point of view. Once you wake up from something, you can’t go back to sleep. 

That was something that I took with me for the rest of my life. I never got to process all of those feelings because of the heels of that, my dad died. 

Which is to say, in writing this piece, I was feeling the shared humanity of wanting to be with someone you love, but at the same time, knowing that there are grander forces at play.

And the worry or fear that people carry — wherever I go as a U.S. citizen, I’m gonna get side eye. And if I were going anywhere as an Iranian citizen, or as an Israeli citizen, or a Lebanese citizen, I might be getting side eye as well. Depending on the situation, different light is shined onto you from other people. 

It reminds me of a Langston Hughes poem — “Mother to Son” — it really hit me when I was in middle school, and started this fire to communicate. A mother tells her son: “Life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.” The visual of that — I got it immediately, and knew that I wanted to be able to replicate that for whatever it is that I’m going through in my life.

What I have learned is that what’s important is not when other people look at you. It’s when you look at you. 

Which is why I wrote, “Be bold! Signal out my name.” That, in a way, is a call back to me as a student in England and Holland and saying, you’re not alone, I’ll always be with you. And if I was with you, I’d be holding you tightly, and telling you, keep going. Keep doing what you need to do. 

Get in touch with Jezrie directly: courtneyjmwriter@gmail.com

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