I love beautiful women,
I also love working women;
But I love beautiful working women
More.
translated by Murat Nemet-Nejat
Month: March 2014
on change: a tanka
days will pass away
change will come with the seasons
time does not stand still
life takes on its own rhythm
and peace will finally reign
Awakening by Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar
And now life’s desolate twilight hour starts
Beyond distant cypresses daylight departs.
The garden of spring don the brightest sun,
The river’s voice rises and then is gone.
The nightingale sings of love’s sorrows
While rings of fire burn the rims of the rose.
translated by Talat S. Halman
A Story of the Sea by Cahit Külebi
We shall always swim together in these blue waters
In this vervain sea that resembles your face.
Beating together, both my pulse and yours
Will strike at death and denounce darkness.
All the fish will chase us from the depths,
Saying Külebi is here now with his loved one.
Like a gull swooping from the vast horizon
The wind will drop shafts of light like pearls.
And the pearls will glitter around your neck,
On your chest and arms, like the words of my verses,
Sea anemone on your hair, your most secret parts,
Like rain, the stars will glide in your eyes.
Our love shall make these blue flames sacred.
translated by Talat S. Halman
Fear by Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar
I have the fear of all things that end,
I am the Blue Eagle who drags the dawn
Along in his iron beak. . .
. . . . . . . . . . . .And life is caught
Within my claws like dangling emeralds
And deathlessness along my lovely swoop
Now bites the thirsty antelope of time.
translated by Talat S. Halman
Boating at Dusk by Song Ik-pil
Lost among flowers, the boat returns late;
expecting the moon, it drifts slowly down the shoals.
Though I’m drunk, I still drop a line:
the boat moves on, but not my dream.
translated by Kim Jong-gil
Song of Cold Pine Pavilion by Chang Yon-u
The moon stands white above Cold Pine Pavilion;
autumn waves are calm on Mirror Lake.
Listen to the sad cries coming and going:
friendly gulls along the sand by the sea.
translated by Kim Jong-gil
a tanka from the Manyoshu by Otomo Yakamochi
You, my love, have asked
if I heard the wild goose cry
though I’m sure you know
The wild goose that cried above
is hidden by distant clouds
translated by Harold Wright
from Songs for a Woman by Yehuda Amichai
When you smile
serious ideas suddenly get drowsy
all night the mountains keep silent at your side–
at morning, the sand goes out with you, to sea
when you do nice things to me
all heavy industry shuts down.
translated by David Rosenberg
the sixties: a tanka: for my friends
something we survived
our minds our hearts still intact
a bit worse for wear
but learned what is possible
deeply engraved on our souls
Leonard Durso 