Trees with green eyes
Doves with white shrouds
And you with red cheeks
My homeland!
This is how the sun’s coffin
Crawls up the sky’s shoulders.
Baktash Abtin, the Iranian poet, documentary filmmaker, and member of the Iranian Writers’ Association died on January 8, 2022, at the age of 47, in Sassan Hospital in Tehran due to delays in receiving medical treatment after contracting COVID-19 in Evin prison. Born Mehdi Kazemi in 1974 in Shahr-e Rey, the capital of Rey county in Tehran province, Abtin was known for short poems depicting intimate moments of everyday life through simple yet compelling imagery. His masterful depiction of the human struggle for freedom and justice was inspired by the experiences of ordinary people caught in extraordinary situations in the wake of war and refugee crises in the Middle East.