Iran

Iran is a country of riddles.
Opinions about it are countless.
I'll tell it straight, without looking back,
About what is there.

In Iran the impossible is possible.
Like sliding on a razor's edge.
It's a country where everything is allowed.
And nothing is allowed.

Some shout: "Freedom!"
Others — put on the hijab.
They've been fighting for six months now:
To ban WhatsApp or not.

Iran was open and secular
Before the others.
And then, not childishly,
Radicalism imposed its norms.

To step into the mosques of Tehran.
To read "Shahnameh" and Rumi.
To reach Isfahan
By bus or by taxi.

To stop in Shiraz.
City of poets, flowers, and wine.
The poems of Saadi and Hafez
To read until late at night.

Delicious Iranian cuisine:
Dizi, samanu, and selery.
And in Russia, how we'll knock back
Vodka, medovukha, and kvass!

Reading the poets, it seemed I grasped the secrets.
The philosophy of the rubaiyat and the Persian language.
I'll recall Omar Khayyam for a moment:
"Man is insignificant — and he is also immeasurably great!"