ALL eyes are on Mahmood Safarian, a writer and poet in his late 60s. He recites his recently penned Persian poem Sarzameen-i-Gomshuda (The Lost Homeland). Mahmood reads from a slightly crumpled paper that describes an elusive homeland. Whether the home is actually there or a figment of his imagination, he doesn’t know.

“Where is she?
I know not how to find her,
The land of lights,
Mother of a million memories,
Home of bright stars.
In the drought of freedom,
She keeps silent a loud cry,
Yet fertile she remains,
...In every fruit she bears,
flows the hidden taste of happiness.
Never will she be dry...”

A lot is said in the silence that follows. A group of old and young people in the small room cheer his poem. A lot of poetry about freedom and breaking free follows.

The poetry club is located in the top corner of 64-year-old Bijan Khalili’s bookstore Ketab Corp in Westwood, Los Angeles. The area, thousands of miles away from Iran, gives outsiders a taste of Tehran. Shops bear names in the Persian script, and the aroma of rice and kebabs wafts across the street leading to Bijan’s bookstore. Los Angeles is often referred to as Tehrangeles owing to the large number of Iranians residing here. Rough estimates put their numbers above half a million with the majority living in West LA and San Fernando Valley.

Mahmood, who holds a PhD in pharmacy, describes himself as a “lover of literature first”. For just one day a month, Mahmood and others from the community, keep their day jobs aside and read out their published or unpublished work to people they have come to count as family.

The poetry club initially began as a place where Iranians who had fled their country around the time of the 1979 Iranian revolution could let loose their pent-up feelings. An open critic of the Shah’s exile and Khomeini’s religious rule, Bijan, fearing execution, fled his homeland with 10 of his favourite books and took refuge in the US in the early 1980s. The first thing Bijan did after moving permanently to the US was to open a bookstore with a special nook named ‘The Prohibited Books in Iran’. It is the most visited section in his bookstore. The next step for Bijan was to start a poetry club where the works of exiled writers and feminists, whether dead or alive, would be read out.

“This particular poetry meeting is charged for a special reason,” smiles Bijan. “For a few months now we have been pinning our hopes on a possible deal between the US and Iran. Nobody knows what the outcome might be for Iran, but we are hoping against hope, for the sake of those who are left behind in Iran.”

The possibility of a historic nuclear deal between the US and Iran was celebrated on the streets of Iran. However, some American-Iranians look at the prospect with “cautious optimism”. It is still not clear whether sanctions on Iran would be lifted or a possible deal would fall through because of the tense history of relations between the two countries.

Emad Keyai, executive director of the American-Iranian Council in New York, says, “There are issues that require broader discussion, for instance regional conflicts, human rights, drug trafficking, instability in Iraq and the fight with the Islamic State. The conflicts that the Middle East faces today cannot end without Iran being taken on board. And keeping that in mind the US policy towards Iran is shifting.”

He adds, “It is naive to assume that it will be an easy process,” with conservative sections in both countries creating obstacles.

For most, the deal is a way of ensuring human rights for the Iranians. Of Assyrian ancestry, George Mansoor, 51, was born and grew up in the northwest of Iran in what is known as Iranian Azerbaijan. “I had everything I wanted in Iran,” he says. “The revolution had ended when I graduated. But the Iran we knew had changed. We felt like unwanted guests.” He left the country and specialised in IT engineering in LA.

“I hope finalising the deal does not only favour the two governments but also works out for the people of Iran,” he says.

The owner of Orange County Soccer Team in Santa Monica, Ali Mansoori, 57, says, “There is a dooming narrative about Iran that everyone wants to believe in. There are good and bad things happening in every other country. Personally, this entire idea of Iran and the US finally sitting face to face and carving out a deal is exciting. Thinking about the number of times Iranian people have felt left out in the past, this is the best news for them in recent times, and which they deserve to feel happy about.”

As the clock struck 10pm, many leave the poetry club in a hurry, some promising to return next month, Bijan, among the last to leave, says he somehow feels different. “It seems something good is about to happen. Anyway, at my age, it’s better to be optimistic, even if cautiously, than be right all the time.”

Published in Dawn, July 12th, 2015

On a mobile phone? Get the Dawn Mobile App: Apple Store | Google Play