The Alborz Mountains in my hometown have been devastated, reduced to a delicate line on a map. Dark clouds dominate the skies over Tehran, while black rain pours over the streets I once roamed. I watch the explosions unfold through snippets of video, wondering: How close was that to my mother’s home? I’m convinced the shockwave reached her.
News arrives via the fragile glass of my phone, making it feel as though the sky itself has descended to the earth. Distance fails to alleviate the terror; it only amplifies my sense of helplessness. Moments like these make me realize that geography is measured not in miles, but in emotional ties. War redefines distances.
Recently, I’ve been drawn back to “The Conference of the Birds,” a 12th-century poem by Attar of Nishapur. In this tale, the world’s birds assemble to find their king, the Simorgh. Guided by the wise hoopoe, they embark on a journey through seven mystical valleys, each testing their resolve. Many birds refuse to start; many more perish on the way. Ultimately, only 30 reach Mount Qaf, where they find not a king but a mirror. In Persian, si morgh translates to “thirty birds,” signifying that their quest was for themselves, united.
Introduced to this story during a Persian literature class in high school in Tehran, it initially seemed like a mystical allegory. Now, it reads as a psychological map. Since the war began, I feel encased in a shadow, formless yet omnipresent. I wake up in New York, instinctively reaching for my phone, barely aware of my surroundings. There is only a sense of placelessness, fear, longing, and sometimes tears. My body is detached from the city’s routines, while my mind remains in Tehran.
The diaspora often entails living parallel existences. But in times like this, the divide becomes unbearable. One life unfolds here, where normalcy prevails, while the other exists elsewhere, accessible only through imagination and worry. In Attar’s poem, each bird hesitates for unique reasons, embodying aspects of human nature. Now, I see in them the psychology of exile, clinging to love, attachment, fear, or certainty that makes the journey impossible.
The destination of Attar’s birds often occupies my thoughts. They fly toward Mount Qaf, the mythical home of the Simorgh, linked in Persian cosmology to Hara Berezaiti and later the Alborz range—the same mountains overlooking Tehran. The birds in Attar’s tale traverse seven valleys seeking a truth seemingly distant. But for me, that mythical peak was always part of my home horizon. Now, those mountains appear in videos of explosions.
As an immigrant, my mind frequently traverses oceans, circling the familiar sky over the Alborz where I once belonged. I wonder if I’m absent from the mountains or if they are absent from my life here. Like Attar’s birds, we journey vast distances only to realize that the place we seek has always existed within us. Perhaps the journey was never about reaching a new destination but about revealing how deeply we remain connected to the landscapes that first taught us to see the sky.
Attar’s story reminds us that not every bird reaches the mountain. Many never begin, many turn back, and only a few arrive. In a world divided by war and distance, I ponder who among us will find that mirror.
