The voice

“My fingers touch still / water, rippling, again, again, again, circling what I love.” These words conclude one of Susan Atefat-Peckham’s poems in her book “That Kind of Sleep.” Her unending, encircling, unfolding love is what people at Georgia College & State University will remember most about Atefat-Peckham.
GC&SU lost one of our own last weekend when Susan Atefat-Peckham and her son Cyrus died in an automobile accident on February 7, in Jordan.
Atefat-Peckham’s poetry left readers with quiet glimpses into her life and culture. She was born in New York to Iranian parents, and she lived in France and Switzerland with summers spent in Iran. Atefat-Peckham viewed creative writing as a way to bridge the cavernous divides between cultures, and she dedicated her life to helping people understand the similarities that all humans share.
Atefat-Peckham often wove together both of her cultures in a single poem, for example, she writes about gender inequality and the need for a Rosa Parks in Iran. Her words created a world where the differences between cultures did not seem so insurmountable.
Along with being a Fulbright Scholar and an award winning poet, Atefat-Peckham was also an abstract expressionist painter and an accomplished pianist. She was also a wife and mother.
Now her friends and family, our university and each of the many places she considered home, will mourn her death. Atefat-Peckham left behind a husband, Joel, and a son, Darius.
Atefat-Peckham’s own poetry resonates with stories of the vacant gaps people leave when they die. In the poem “Nikita’s Grave,” dedicated to the loss of her sister, she writes about the cycle of life and death. “Only the dying fill / with sounds and words and paint and clay. / Somewhere in Jersey my name is written / stiff and white. / It is autumn. The empty / define. There is red beauty in dying from / the edges in. Old leaves unwind, circle, / knit in the air, the black roots. I settle along / spaces people weave, petals crochet black / branches white before they fill with green.”
GC&SU will hold a memorial service to honor Atefat-Peckham on Friday, Feb. 13 at noon in the A&S Auditorium.

Posted by Colonnade Archives on Feb 13 2004. Filed under Our Voice. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry