“The white giant in chains!” This is how Bahar, one of Iran’s greatest contemporary poets, describes Mount Damvand, the towering volcano that looms over the horizon in the Tehran region.
At the end of his qasida (ode) Bahar pleads with the volcano to end its silence with an explosion of fire and lava to “cleanse the world of tyranny and corruption”.
For the past two weeks, the nationwide uprising across Iran has reminded many Iranians of Bahar’s poem with the question: Has the volcano begun its final eruption?
