Rooted in stories,

community grows.

Kucheh Nameh

Memory
Issue No. 1

Issue No. 1

Letter from the editor

For our first issue, we settled on the theme of memory because, as many of us navigated war from afar, our memories and the memories of our family members became both a refuge and, at times, a source of pain — bringing comfort, connection, and continuity, while also surfacing hidden or long-forgotten traumas. Through this issue, we sought to make sense of that tension and to explore the ways memory can shape resistance, document the past, and complicate our futures.

Read the Letter

Essay

Kucheh

Diba TajAbadi

Divar

Diba TajAbadi

The walls speak. Now, they are asking me to speak as well.

Diba TajAbadi

Neda Zahraie

Mémas: memories of my grandmother

Neda Zahraie

A grandmother, but also something more—the balance, the fixed point one can return to with every turn.

Neda Zahraie

Samir Saeidi سمیر سعیدی

مغروض جنگی

Samir Saeidi سمیر سعیدی

جنگ که شروع شد، من تقریباً هیچ کاری نکردم جز ماندن. نه قهرمانی در کار بود، نه فرار، نه پناهگاه، نه حتی اضطرابی که بشود اسمش را ترس گذاشت.

Samir Saeidi سمیر سعیدی

Sarah Kia

How it all began, somewhere in the middle

Sarah Kia

The act of collecting enables us to reframe context and create an entirely new composition.

Sarah Kia

Shima Talebi شیما طالبی

سقفمون افسوس و افسوس

Shima Talebi شیما طالبی

از ساختمان سفید سنگی که بیرون می‌آیم، لحظه‌ای متوقف می‌شوم. چشم می‌دوزم به برچسب ویزا که وسط گذرنامه‌ام جا خوش کرده.

Shima Talebi شیما طالبی

Diba TajAbadi

Moshaknegari

Diba TajAbadi

Lost in the cloud of the internet blackout, a black cloud that has been hanging over the Iranian plateau since January, anything becomes internet.

Diba TajAbadi

Elham Khatami

One Was, One Was Not

Elham Khatami

I recall the past to untangle the present, to understand how glimpses of possibility and promise can be muddied by forces outside of our control.

Elham Khatami

Poetry

Kucheh

Nina Kamooei

Origins

Nina Kamooei

There’s a pain in the heart as if it’s sore from walking too far past mountains,
looking for another cavity to beat in

Nina Kamooei

Arman Kazemi

First Generation

Arman Kazemi

My country, though I wasn’t your birth-child
you still folded me in
where I took root

Arman Kazemi

Mountain Sonnet to Zal

Arman Kazemi

Tell me your name
so I can write it in the blank lines between stars

Arman Kazemi

Shokoofeh Rajabzadeh

Oh Poetry, I said I’m not a poet

Shokoofeh Rajabzadeh

I said I’m not a poet.
A writer, but not the poet kind.
I know, I know. It’s strange to hear.

Shokoofeh Rajabzadeh

Arman Kazemi

Iran

Arman Kazemi

Mother who nurtures you
in one gesture weans you
and cradles the world.

Arman Kazemi

Visual art

Kucheh

Mina Fouladi

Copy of a copy

Mina Fouladi

This body of work navigates the paradox of holding on and letting go, preserving fleeting moments of home while accepting their inevitable disappearance.

Mina Fouladi

Shayesteh Farazi

دفترچه خاطرات من

Shayesteh Farazi

با نگاه به عکس‌ها خاطراتی از لحظات آن زمان برایمان تداعی می‌شود که دیگر قابل تکرار نیست ودر واقع این عکس‌ها هستند که آن خاطرات را جاودانه کرده‌اند. در اینجا با تأکید بر همین موضوع لحظه‌هایی از زندگی‌ام را ثبت کرده‌ام که با دیدن آنها می‌توانم خودم را در عکس‌ها پیدا کنم و روزهایی را که سپری کرده‌ام به خاطر آورم

Shayesteh Farazi

Kimia Seifi

The city I love

Kimia Seifi

All throughout the blackout, I would screenshot any picture and video coming out of Iran which sparked familiarity even if I had never been to the area depicted.

Kimia Seifi

Mohammadreza Eslami

The Cypresses Are Not Who You Think They Are

Mohammadreza Eslami

It was only January. Ears could hear the seething wind through faintly yellowed cypresses standing starkly in the vast nothingness of the plain that was keeping poppies hidden under layers and layers of white.

Mohammadreza Eslami