Day of Hope

The Day of Hope was commissioned by the Augsburg College Riverside Singers for the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize Forum in honor of Shirin Ebadi, Iranian human rights lawyer and recipient of the 2003 Nobel Peace Prize. It seemed fitting to use Persian texts of the 11th through the 14th centuries – Khayyam, Sa’di, Hafez, Khaqani – as well as Ms. Ebadi’s own words, taken from her Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech.

Just as the texts have been filtered through their translators’ 19th- and 20th-century sensibilities, so the music is a free translation into the Western concert idiom of traditional Persian music, its exotically ornamented monody, its unfamiliar modes.

Special thanks to Randall Davidson, Miriam Gerberg, Claire Givens and Andrew Dipper, Jay Johnson, Kathy Kienzle, Pary Pezechkian, and Dan Rein.

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Instrumental Parts available for Oboe, Percussion (Seed Pod Rattle, Doumbek, Crotales, Small Triangle, Rain Stick, Ceramic Rattle, Sistrum) and Harp

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I. The Worldly Hope

The Worldly Hope men set their Hearts upon
turns Ashes – or it prospers; and anon,
Like Snow upon the Desert’s dusty Face
Lighting a little Hour or two – is gone.

Then to the rolling Heav’n itself I cried,
Asking, “What Lamp had Destiny to guide
Her little Children stumbling in the Dark?”
And – “A blind understanding!” Heav’n replied.

#14,#35 from the Rubaiyat
Omar Khayyam (llth century)
trans. Edward Fitzgerald (1809-1883)

In the name of the God of Creation and Wisdom.
Shirin Ebadi*

II. Marhaba!

Marhaba! Religion and Knowledge. Marhaba! justice and equity.
Marhaba! country and government. – May they always be lasting!

couplet 190 from the Introduction to The Bustan (1257)
Shaikh Muslihu-d-Din Sa’di Shirazi
trans. H.Wilberforce Clarke ( 1879)

A human being divested of all dignity, a human being deprived of human rights, a human being gripped by starvation, a human being beaten by famine, war and illness, a humiliated human being and a plundered human being is not in any position or state to recover the rights he or she has lost.
Shirin Ebadi*

So long as thou canst, wound not the heart of the people;
But if thou dost, – thou dost pluck up thy own roots.

Oh God! keep me on the work of goodness;
Otherwise, no work can come from me.

couplets #37 &#I7 from Chapter 1 of The Bustan
Shaikh Muslihu-d-Din Sa’di Shirazi
trans. H. Wilberforce Clarke

If the 21st century wishes to free itself from the cycle of violence, acts of terror and war, and avoid repetition of the experience of the 20th century – that most disaster-ridden century of humankind, there is no other way except by understanding and putting into practice every human right for all mankind, irrespective of race, gender, faith, nationality or social status.

In anticipation of that day.
Shirin Ebadi*

III. The Day of Hope

The Day of Hope, hid beneath Sorrow’s veil,
Has shown its face – ah, cry that all may hear:
Come forth! the powers of night no more prevail!

from 166 of the Diwan
Hafiz (ca. 1325-ca. 1390)
trans. Gertrude Lowthian Bell (1897)

Morning veiled in woven prisms
breaks the seal of its breath,
exhales ropes of amber
for the angels’ tents.
Dawn’s flat blade shines
like a metal page
with jewels upon jewels.
Chain mail of the clouds:
rings linked with rings
locks within locks.

from Language of the Birds
Khaqani (ca. 12th century)
trans. Peter Lamborn Wilson and Nasrollah Pourjavady**

copyright permission:

* Nobel Lecture
Copyright (c) Nobel Foundation, Stockholm, 2003.

** The Drunken Universe: An Anthology of Persian Sufi Poetry
Peter Lamborn Wilson and Nasrollah Pourjavady
copyright (c) Omega Publications, Inc., 1987