Mohtasham Kashani
One of the most original poets of the Safavid era was Mohtasham Kashani. A native of Kashan, he began by writing lyrics and panegyrics. It was characteristic of the Safavid attitude toward secular poets that when Mohtasham sent Shah Tahmasp two eloquent panegyrics, the Shah did not offer him any rewards. Tahmasp, like his successors, believed that poets should only and only extol the holiness of the Shiite Imams. It was probably because of this preference that Mohtasham composed his celebrated Haft Band, a poem of ninety-six distiches written in praise of the Imams. The fact that Mohtasham had to spent part of his time as a silk seller indicates that even his masterpiece of religious verse did not secure him a worthy reward from the king.
Haft Band opened the door to a
host of poems written about the Shiite martyrs, especially Ali and Hussein.
None of these approaches Mohtasham's poem in simplicity and directness of
expression, in sincerity, and in graphicness. Unhampered by excessive verbal
conceits and other rhetorical pyrotechnics, his poetry is at once melodious,
evocative, and enriched with striking words and conceits. Though another poem of
Mohtasham, an elegy written on the death of his brother, is also famous, it is
his Haft Band that is often quoted because it is not only the first but
also the best known among the poems written in praise of the Imams.
