were made
in twilight
difficult to keep
at midnight
broken
by dawn
Month: June 2014
from Rubaiyat by Nazim Hikmet
4
I painted you on canvas only once
but picture you a thousand times a day.
Amazingly, your image there will last:
canvas has a longer life than I. . .
5
I can’t kiss or make love to your image,
but there in my city you’re flesh and blood,
and your red mouth, the honey I’m denied, your big eyes, really are,
and your surrender like rebel waters, your whiteness I can’t even touch. . .
translated by Randy Blasing & Mutlu Konuk
from Things I Didn’t Know I Loved by Nazim Hikmet
I didn’t know I loved clouds
whether I’m under or up above them
whether they look like giants or shaggy white beasts
moonlight the falsest the most languid the most petit-bourgeois
strikes me
I like it
I didn’t know I liked rain
whether it falls like a fine net or splatters against the glass my
heart leaves me tangled up in a net or trapped inside a drop
and takes off for uncharted countries I didn’t know I loved
rain but why did I suddenly discover all these passions sitting
by the window on the Prague-Berlin train
is it because I lit my sixth cigarette
one alone could kill me
is it because I’m half dead from thinking about someone back in Moscow
her hair straw-blond eyelashes blue
the train plunges on through the pitch-black night
I never knew I liked the night pitch-black
sparks fly from the engine
I didn’t know I loved sparks
I didn’t know I loved so many things and I had to wait until sixty
to find out sitting by the window on the Prague-Berlin train
watching the world disappear as if on a journey of no return
translated by Randy Blasing & Mutlu Konuk
on good intentions
they say
the road to hell
is paved
with good intentions
and so it is
it is
with voices crying
damning you
for eternity
and a day
Migration II by Orhan Veli Kanık
Now
One can see trees
From his window.
And it rains during the day
Along the canal.
The moon comes up at night
And there is a Thursday market
In the square.
But he,
Perhaps it is exile, money,
Perhaps a letter,
He thinks of something else.
translated by Murat Nemet-Nejat
on sleeping dogs
he said
I seemed tired
of what I’d been doing
this in way of understanding
my plans
no sense in embellishing
let sleeping dogs
sleep
content peaceful
reality is
after all
what one perceives
no point in explaining
when you’re halfway
out the gate
Migration I by Orhan Veli Kanık
From his window
Overlooking house tops
One could see the harbor
And church bells rang
Rang continuously on Sundays;
And at night
He could hear the train whistle
From his bed
At one o’clock;
And he began to love a girl
In the apartment
Across the street.
Despite all this
He left the place
And moved to another town.
translated by Murat Nemet-Nejat
what one can and cannot do
you can’t mend
all the fences
put out
all the fires
feed all the hungry
in this world
you can only walk
the road you find
yourself on
by choice or design
or happenstance
and try not to hurt
anyone if possible
while reconciling yourself
to being misunderstood
more often
than not
on retreat
there are times
when retreating
is the wise course
especially considering
a Pyrrhic victory
the alternative
A Fragment by Orhan Veli Kanık
I should have been
Have been
A fish
In a bottle
Of booze.
translated by Murat Nemet-Nejat
Leonard Durso 