This world drives you out of your mind,
This night, these stars, this fragrance,
This tree bursting with flowers from tip to toe.
translated by Talat S. Halman
poetry
Living by Orhan Veli Kanık
I
I know living isn’t an easy thing to do
Or falling in love and singing of your girl
Taking a stroll under the stars at night
Warming up in the sunshine by day
Sneaking out for half a day to take it easy
On top of Istanbul’s loveliest hill
–Countless shades of blue flow in the Bosphorus–
And to forget all in the legions of blue.
II
I know living isn’t an easy thing to do
But look
The bed of a dead man is still warm,
A dead man’s wristwatch is ticking.
Brother, living is no easy affair,
But dying isn’t easy, either.
Leaving the world isn’t easy at all.
translated by Talat S. Halman
For You by Orhan Veli Kanık
For you, my fellow humans,
Everything is for you,
Nights are for you, days are for you;
Daylight is for you, moonlight is for you;
Leaves in the moonlight,
Wonder and wisdom in the leaves,
Myriad greens in daylight,
Yellow is for you, and pink.
The feel of the skin on the palm,
Its warmth,
Its softness,
The comfort of lying down;
For you are all the greetings
And the masts swaying in the harbor;
Names of the days,
Names of the months,
Fresh paint on rowboats is for you,
Mailmen’s feet,
Potters’ hands,
Sweat on foreheads.
Bullets fired on battlefields;
Graves are for you and tombstones,
Jails and handcuffs and death sentences
Are for you.
Everything is for you.
translated by Talat S. Halman
from I love you beyond the depth of my soul by Yunus Emre
Don’t ask me about me: I’m not inside me–
In its robe, my body walks on, all empty.
My love for you has plucked me away from me:
What sweet pain is this? It’s beyond remedy.
translated by Talat S. Halman
This is such a day by Rumi
This is such a day, the sun is dazzling twice as before
A day beyond all days, unlike all others–say no more. . .
Lovers, I have great news for you from the heavens above
This day of love brings songs and flowers in a downpour.
translated by Talat S. Halman
Rumi on pronoun use
At one time when life was real, your soul was one with my soul:
All we were, open or secret, was part of the same whole.
If “you” and “I” are pronouns I use, they are only terms–
In truth, there can be no separate you or I at all.
translated by Talat S. Halman
an invitation by Rumi
Come, come, you will never find a friend like me.
Where is a beloved like me in all the world?
Come, don’t waste your life running back and forth.
You are like a dry valley, I am the rain.
You are a city laid to waste, I am the architect.
Come!
translated by Talat S. Halman
Is by Fazıl Hüsnü Dağlarca
To love
Is
To double
The world
translated by Talat S. Halman
Shadow by Fazıl Hüsnü Dağlarca
The person we love
Is the shadow
Of our face
In the future
translated by Talat S. Halman
what love is by Rumi
Love is the water of eternal life, cures every woe;
Gardens where lovers reunite drive away all sorrow.
They say there is a window that opens from heart to heart;
If there are no walls, there is no need for any window.
translated by Talat S. Halman
Leonard Durso 