Sunday, April 1, 2018

AYTEN MUTLU



AYTEN MUTLU

THE MOON IN THE MIDDLE EAST

the moon is of stone, not of light here
it is an old mill in the land of wind
the water it touches bleeds in the skin of the black-oil
like a wounded silence


the moon is the blood clot of infinity here
scattered sands of heart in a mirrorless night
is a puzzle smelling blood
which shines in a dagger stock


the moon is a negro who assumes himself a white
a mirror which time has dropped
in the border of the borderless defeat
the rhythm confined to the unbreakable circle
the dream which is sometimes taken out
fusty chests and seen


the moon is a lightning buried in dust
a stickless dervish in an unfinished tale
who girded on his sword in a tent
a decaying sheath, a non-determined insurrection
that burns in the womb of an unfinished night
hungry for pain, a suicide to happiness


the desolated wail of the shattering earth
the meaning trembling in the foam of the soul
man’s hopeless lovemaking with chaos
the first line of the retorted silence
the last festival of the vintage in the soul
the torn innocence of the atom
in the first night of the crazy world


the moon, eternal kaf mountain in the heart of the stone
the submissive mother’s insane and gentle child
the time of being hungry for pain of momentless livings
the noble animal of poetry that has broken off its chain
from the walls of the first cave


the moon is the straight bridge of purity here
the reed flute which the doomsday middleman plays
the wine spilled on the day from the jug of the darkness
the glazeless split of night in the thick part of the glaze
the blood of man leaking from creaked soil
the satrap shooting off foxed boks


the moon is an oasis waiting in the desert here
the bedouin sleep on hyena’s feet
the hell called paradise in the silver domes
the arachis oil smell in parcel bombs
thrown to the past from God’s ceiling


time is the changing face of the moon here
the endless rosary of patience in adobe caves
whose future is knotted to its past
it is an earthquake watching the overground
on the silkroad of the word exiled to underground


for the moon is a lonely shaman
carrying the light in his heart in the Middle East

TRANSLATED BY BAKİ YİĞİT



ORTADOĞU’DA AY

ay burada taştandır, ışıktan değil
eski bir değirmendİr rüzgârın ülkesinde
değdiği sular yaralı bir sessizlik
gibi kanar karayağın teninde


burada ay sonsuzluğun pıhtısı
dağılan yürek kumu aynasız bir gecede
bir hançerin sapında parıldayan
kan kokulu bilmece


ay burada kendini beyaz sanan bir zenci
zamanın elinden düşürdüğü bir ayna
sınırında sınırsız yenilginin
kırılmaz çembere hapsolan ritim
küf kokan sandıklardan
arada bir çıkarılıp bakılan rüya


ay, toza gömülü şimşek
asasız dervişi bitmeyen bir masalın
kılıcını kuşanmış bir çadırda
çürüyen kın, kararsız bir ihtilal
bitmeyen bir gecenin rahminde yanan
acıya aç, mutluluğa intihar


çatırdayan toprağın ıssız iniltisi
canın köpüğünde titreyen anlam
umutsuz sevişmesi insanın ve kaosun
imbikten damıtılan suskunun ilk dizesi
son şenliği ruhta bağbozumunun
çıldıran dünyanın ilk gecesinde
atomun yırtılan masumiyeti


ay, ebedi kaf dağı taşın kalbinde
deli ve uysal çocuğu tevekkül anaların
ansız yaşamaların acıya aç zamanı
ilk mağaranın duvarlarından
zincirini koparmış soylu şiir hayvanı


ay burada saflığın sırat köprüsü
kıyamet tellalının üflediği  ney
karanlığın testisinden güne saçılan şarap
sırın ince yerinde sırsız gece kırığı
insan kanı çatlak topraktan sızan
sararmış kitaplardan fırlayan satrap


burada ay, çölde bekleyen vaha
sırtlan ayaklarında bir bedevi uykusu
yaldızlı kubbelerde cennet adlı cehennem
tanrılar katından geçmişe fırlatılan
bombalı paketlerde fıstık yağı kokusu


zaman burda ayın değişen yüzü
kerpiç mağaralarda sonsuz sabır tesbihi
geleceği geçmişine düğümlü
yeraltına sürülmüş  sözün ipek yolunda
bir depremdir yerüstünü bekleyen

çünkü ay ışığı yüreğinde taşıyan
yalnız bir şamandır Ortadoğu’da





FEMİNA

what a ritual is required for this curse, Femina
in order to assemble the fragments of life
with which magical words will you dance
at the dawn of the new day?

this is the curse of thousands of years, Femina
there is no another day, another world
come on dance, holding a bowl of poison
with iron rings around your ankles

pry up the nail of all the holy books
with the nacre flowers of the self-conscious syllables
dance Femina with your thin heels
shake the scarlet opal of the soil

curl in the image of Mother Cybele
like the thin snake of the cool stars
in the lair of the long furry animals

there is no another day, another world
play the deception of a thousand years, femine
with the proud bells of obedience

the old rhythm, the sound of tearing flesh inside of you
the sighs of the helpless silence
will accompany your dance

do not expect a signal from the age of the silver shadows
come like a shadow in the light
have the pure drink of contradiction
as if sipping the honeyed sorbets
come like a burning land in the summer mist

blow in from the edges of the mind crashing into the madness
from mister god’s bed
from the fog in black tulle

in black roses
in the red-hot foam of the laced cookers

come on dance, the ritual has already begun
play the bells of love with your magic hands
Femina, the crazy bride of gentleness

dance on the day of black yarn of the shiny stones
dance with the cursed scream of the swamp birds
dance the browned soldier of the everyday struggles
dance to the inviting rhythm of the lost lives

there is no another day, another world
at the dawn of the new day
Femina
Dance !

TRANSLATED BY BAKI YIĞIT






MADLY IN LOVE WITH SKY

In a place where your dreams are lost, where your heart’s burnt into ashes
I am caressing the very beginning,
that bursting demon, the reply of the silence
the shuddering substance is calling me to the deadend
a flower is blooming slowly and silently
one who is madly in love with the sky
just before the rain, that ancient balance
the scattered  souls are shivering
just after visiting a graveyard, that scream without any coast
the inside of my bones getting all wet

the dead who are prayed for
the dead who are not prayed for
the happy-go-lucky feast of larva
the nestling of the sparrow is falling down the nest
the web-like membrane is wrapping up the memory of time
the eye lids of the sleepless seed ar heavy
an underground maddness
is kissing my heart

was it only because of the broken lines of life
because of the orchards that we walked in
the crops
how can the song of the siren of  nonexistence be answered

the shuddering substance is calling me to the deadend
an abandoned train is frightened of being lost
one that is lost among straight lines
each wave is at the narrow beach of the soul
testing itself at the precipitous cliffs

I became the motherland, not the lover
my misdeeds ran before me, faster and faster
how shall I wake up my soul so  darkened
says one of the dead
to whom should I ask
where and who I am

so good for the dead not to question
the dead with yellow voices
the freesia that blooms in the moon
the guardians of the graveyard flowers
have all forgotten the red
being cold
kissing
what kind of a freedom is this?
your dreams, all lost, where your heart is burnt into ashes
at noon, in the graveyard, just before the darkness
I am caressing the devil, the one who is weeping
one more flower is withering with a rumbling sound
not caring about the tranquility of the dead


Translated by Baki Yiğit



AYTEN  MUTLU

AYTEN  MUTLU:  A Turkish poet and writer (born in Bandırma, Turkey. Graduated from the Faculty of Management  of İstanbul University in 1975. She was retired from The Central Bank. Her political activism began in high school, when she was fifteen years old. Being in political activity she took part in the Women’s  Rights Movement too. She has published poetry, prose, short stories and essays on literary criticism. She also translated the works of a number of contemporary poets from English to Turkish that published many of them in periodicals. She translates the works of the women poets from Antiquity to the present days in  selections from the world over. Her research on women poets from Antiquity to the present day, published in many literary magazines. She presented papers at some universities. Some of her poems took place in many countries, some magazines, newspapers and anthologies in France, Sweden, Germany, Spain, Senegal, Morocco, Italy, Serbia, Iraq, Syria, Jordan, Macedonia, Romania, Spain, Argentina, South Korea, India and Russia. She is a laureate of  Ibrahim Yildizoglu Literary Prize (1999), Poetry Prize of the International Meeting of the Poets of Yalova (2001) and Sunullah Arısoy Literary Prize (2005). Akkoy Magazine Poetry Labor Award (2015) İsmet Kemal Karadayı poetry honorary award (2017) Some Critics wrote about her poems: “Her poetry explodes with sound and meaning. She reflects a struggle within herself, as well as a view of the world in which all horror and beauty are seen at once and often intermingled. Her opposition and political ideas are reflected in her poems but from a lyrical point of view.” “Mutlu is a master the condensed poem, of the image that illumines and quietly explodes with sound and meaning” She said about her work; “My aim is to write poems that will sing like the peoples songs of the world. I wish to reach and enrich people in mines, on farms, homes, factories, prisons: to entertain, to show, to illumine. Because, I believe that poetry is wide broad like life and will somehow  succesfully call the humanity in people.

Works: Dayan Ey Sevdam (Resist Oh My Love, 1984), Vaktolur (A Time Comes When…, 1986), Seni Özledim (I Missed You, 1990), Kül İzi (The Trace of Ash, 1993), Denize Doğru (Towards the Sea, 1996), Çocuk ve Akşam (Child And Evening, 1999), Taş Ayna (Stone Mirror, 2002), Yitik Anlam Peşinde (In Search of Lost Meaning, 2004), Ateşin Köklerinde (In Roots Of Fire - Selected Poems, 2006) Uzun Gemide Akşam (Le soir Dans Le Bateau Long, 2007) Eşikte (At Threshold-2009) долга вечер на одборот (published in 2011 in Macedonian) Threshold (2009), Istanbul eyes (Ochii Istanbulului-2012 in Romania- Les Yeux d’Istanbul poésie-2014 in France and published in Turkey in 2013 ) Stone Mirror- poetry published in India-2014 Dew Drops (2016) Sipirit Cycle-poetry published in Serbia-2017


1 comment :

  1. Dear Ayten Mutlu; She said; "Song of the Future is poetry."is a world poet who tells how great the role of poetry will be in shaping the future of societies.
    I wish success.

    With My Love...

    ReplyDelete