Hoora Sarajan
2024/2025 was indeed a hard year. I care more about the containers I use in my haftseen than the actual symbolic items. I use plates, bowls, and holders that belonged to people who were very dear to me—and still are—but are no longer in my life.
The crystal ashtray holding the sib (apple) is from my grandma, Mamanjoon—the little cutie, a ball of sweetness that she was. Now, she doesn’t recognize me… she has become a child again, Fateme… I’ve lost her to dementia.
The two little vases with yellow and purple crocuses, which I picked from the Holy Trinity Congregation graveyard, are from my dear A. So many times I’ve wanted to break them… but here they are.
The hyacinths are a must. I usually dislike their intense smell, but my resistance to intensity has softened a bit. I want to contain intensity more…
The blue crystal wine holder is from a past dear friend, M. She gave it to me at a time when we barely knew each other, and yet we became like sisters—living on the same street, like two kids jump-walking and singing through Alpean sceneries in old Japanese cartoons… At some point, I stopped jumping. She didn’t come back for me. She kept singing and jumping forward… still, I hold the wine holder. It contains my grief for her.
The other ikebana-ed crocuses sit in a scent bowl from my dearest Er. Er isn’t there anymore, but the sweetest Eri keeps going on. Er was the little pink unicorn drinking indigo water during a little k-trip on their Persian carpet in Flatbush… while the AC beeped every hour, reminding me I was getting closer to my flight back.
The moss is also from the cemetery. I use moss instead of sabzeh… I prefer cemetery moss. Sprouts feel too hopeful. I prefer the calm of accepting death. When we embody death, we become more of a psychoanalytic subject. And all we want… is embodiment.
There’s a little brass tincture from S in the moss. They gave it to me on an unmemorable day… though the pain they left—I remember it every day. I remember agreeing that we were family—S, S, and M—while hugging our cold, sweaty bodies after a dance, right before lockdown.
My “s”age is in a bowl-like thing N made. The samanoo is in a teacup K gave me for my birthday. K is beauty. K is all I wanted but could never have.
And many of the other vases and copper coin holders are from L. L is still in my life. L is the glue to my fragments. L is my childhood friend. L is friendship forever.
The copal holder is a broken piece of pottery I stole from a little shop in CDMX. It shattered in my bag… I glued it back together.
I no longer care about the symbols of haftseen.
I want to be contained by the representational objects—of the internalized objects—of all the beautiful beings who touched me. And as Ogden says, “a storm came over my psyche.”
These are the containers of me.
Of this year.
Of the us.
All contained.