In honour of Mahmud's 90th birthday, sharing his poem "Migration of Ducks" in Persian, English, and song, as presented by Joan Epstein
Text & video source: https://www.youtube.com/@joanepstein4427
Feb 26, 2023
Perhaps the most moving and beautifully crafted poems set to music in my Duck Songs is "Migration of Ducks" by Mahmud Kianush (1934-2021). Kianush was a scholar of both classical Persian literature and English literature who lived in Iran until political changes in the mid 1970s forced him to move to London. There, he continued teaching and writing poetry, eventually establishing a website devoted to Persian poetry. I encountered his bilingual poem "Migration of Ducks" on his website when researching duck songs and duck poems. I wrote to him in 2012, asking for permission to set the poem to music. He quickly agreed and sent me two inscribed volumes of his poetry in gratitude for my interest in his work. This poem, with phrases such as "no borders, no passports" is pertinent across the continents as refugees stream from one hot spot to another in hopes of finding peace, security, and personal freedom.
Because the poem resonates with both elements of traditional Iranian aesthetics and of modern English and American aesthetics, I make a shift in musical language when the poem moves from Persian to English. The Persian section has a piano part resembling music for santur, a large hammered dulcimer and a vocal part with the ornamental nuances of classical Persian singing. Tenor Todd Frizzell sang this music with pianist Brent Douglas on Feb. 12, 2023 to end my Looking Forward, Looking Back retrospective concert on the Eckerd College campus. Ten years after composing Duck Songs, they were finally performed to mark the end of a 42-year teaching career at Eckerd.
Here is the text. I've omitted a couple of lines from Kianush's original since the entire poem is presented first in Persian:
Migration of Ducks Bilingual text in Persian and English by Mahmud Kianush. Transliteration also by Kianush (1934-2021), a scholar of classical Persian literature as well as a playwright and poet who spent his final years as a refugee in London. He described his writing as being in Persian, not Farsi.
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