Roof eaves pillar
Evening and trees all around
Two cats on the wall
Opposite each other
Two totems
Two passionate cats.

translated by Ruth Christie & Richard McKane

Sad-eyed cows of the plain
Lost in dreams
Don’t even turn and look at you.

translated by Ruth Christie & Richard McKane

When the tortoise turns on its back
Its death pursues it
All through the yellow evenings.

translated by Ruth Christie & Richard McKane

I woke and saw one morning
The sun had struck my heart,
I was like the birds and leaves
Fluttering in a spring wind.
I was like the birds and leaves,
My whole body’s in revolt,
I was like the birds and leaves,
Birds
And leaves.

translated by George Messo

It makes me blue getting a letter,
Makes me blue drinking gin,
Makes me blue setting out on a trip,
I’ve no idea what will come of it.
When they sing the folk song “My Kazim”
In Üsküdar
It makes me blue.

translated by George Messo

Since I always think of her
In my bed at night,
While I love her still
I’ll love my bed too.

translated by George Messo

From where it lies, a cat raises its head as if to speak,
opens its mouth, but not a word comes out,
then falls again into sleep to speak in the dream.

translated by Sidney Wade & Efe Murad

What a race this is, long, introverted,
In secret or openly it lasts a lifetime.
Kith and kin, wife and children, we’re all lined up.
The minute hand nears the hour. Time moves
And wins, the Hare with the split lip sleeps,
In the storybooks he runs like lightning.

translated by Ruth Christie & Richard McKane

I love beautiful women,
I love working women too;
Beautiful working women
I love more.

translated by George Messo

I’d not heard a sound
Of pigeons and doves at the window.
Had that urge to travel
Stirred again in me?
What of that seaweed smell,
The screech of seagulls in the air.
What is it?
A journey, of course, a journey.

translated by George Messo