Long Noiselessly Poems

Turkish Poetry Translations II

Çanakkale Sehitlerine
"For the Çanakkale Martyrs"
by Mehmet Akif Ersoy
loose English translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Was there ever anything like the Bosphorus war??
The earth’s mightiest armies pressing Marmara,
Forcing entry between her mountain passes
To a...

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Wave a sea softened
                  and a pain and a tenderness
        ...

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I lie awake inside my mind's ride
Gotta body-quake it away side by side
I fly away from my cage inside
And…I…and I tried to peacefully hide

I…tried to peacefully hide – denied 
Please don’t subside...don’t kill me with...

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Yahya Kemal Beyatli translations

Yahya Kemal Beyatli (1884-1958) was a Turkish poet, editor, columnist and historian, as well as a politician and diplomat. Born born Ahmet Âgâh, he wrote under the pen names Agâh Kemal, Esrar,...

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I was quite the cunning magician, famed for my illusions and sleight of hand,
Like cool tricks that jade green nature plays, that often we don't understand.

Days were filled with wonder and enchantment, like purple, star...

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Is not ‘Mother’ the sweetest word in the dictionary?
She's one’s closest friend, companion, and guide.
How can I restrict her within the frame of a poem,
when my entire world circled around her once?

As I think of...

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The grey clouds roll in from the southeast
like a cumbersome beast
a thick pewter fog smothering all
a hollow silence
menacing but devoid of violence.

Face pales with blood draining
ears straining

The mass hovers almost low enough to touch
I reach...

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Jenna lived in rural Wyoming lands,
where grass rolled over small ridges and buttes,
a small town way out in the cow country,
where the ranchers still throw lassos in loops.

She was driving out to see her boyfriend,
who...

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Nope! I haint gonna crack'n on the heat... just yet
until the cowed chickens come home to roost!

Sunlight streaming thru window
body electric of mine doth whet
begets hardiness to acclimate
against PECO shut off threat
ideal opportunity to spouse
analogous...

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Reindeer herd - heard clattering

Rangifer tarandus kept
this deep sleeper awake
cavorting, deer ring
escapade haint fake
dreamt only a smattering while

Santa did shimmy and shake
with ho...ho...ho...
no worry mate - everything's jake
resonating resembling thus Spake
Zarathustra jollity did quake.

Yours truly...

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bohemian rhapsody parades
     amidst greensward moored
erupting profusely toward cerulean skies
     ushered with invisible rip cord
this Earthling self assigned to an (elder)
     box office...

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People are, constantly, selfishly numbering their troubles endlessly 
While you are listening to them patiently and hopelessly
They write elegies describing unrequited love, themselves,
Their pain, feeling blue,
But this elegy is only for you-
Everyone is writing sad...

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KITTY

G.
A cat walked across the street
(After looking both ways).
It was a pretty Kitty.
There were trees across the street.
In the trees there were squirrels.
The squirrels raised families.
They ate acorns,
they made babies,
they slept.

PG.
A cat stepped across the...

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RITES OF PASSAGE
Each Christmas we all gathered there,
‘Aunt Clare, has more room ,after all’ with
her trestled tables and chair.
Grown-ups swigging their brown bottled ale,
young-uns, lemonade with paper straw,
VE style parties, once more.
Lunch over, the voice...

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you have a mind
that's it
which in itself is victory
scant though it may be
your mileage may vary 
on this floating grain of sand
he prayed over and over
be far away be far far away
at least he was...

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In my imagination,
My vision encapsulates
Dusk’s parting darkness,
 and silver clouds appearing between,
 dull twinkling stars.
As night melts to early February morn,
the moon lies half hidden in the dormant skies.

As the morning moon shines,
A murder of...

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(alternately titled ringleader Harris hooligan,
Hence, any resemblance 
     between characters port
rayed, and living persons 
     purely coincidental.)

Claim to fame creating
     an overnight sensational
...

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VBT Practice 90 of 112

We being in a bind
Of limited identity-mind
We do not negate
Rather we cooperate!

We make no fuss
We go where thoughts take us
In the external
As well as in the internal
In the ethereal
Or the feral
No...

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love is a lofty ideal 
croon of tenderness
sounds right, feels good
but how may we share
what we do not have

a hollow emptiness 
engulfs our body-mind
womb of space suffocates
we are uncomfortable 
in our own skin

being empowered
we pause...

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I have gazed long at the turbulent
  while piled high cloud masses
I have watched the millions of stars at night
  the damp fog has come and surrounded me
and the land is silent
 ...

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Lay down noiselessly,
as long as you stay still
and breathe lightly, then they will ignore you.

You can smile under your eyelids,
you can pretend that they have legs
and wear business suits.
You can imagine milking the poison
out of...

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Ice Sleep Quickly...

Slowly counting backwards from one hundred
if restless, yet most every night/early morning,
when tiredness defeats ability to remain alert
though rarely these days no difficulty to dream
way before mentally mouthing the number zero,

a segue way...

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Nascent thought provoking
threads flit to and fro
unseen solitary pinball wizard
cavalierly fiddles indiscriminately
leveraging outcome

silently holistic thought fragments
strewn staccoto scattershot
attenuated blitzkrieg
brain storm saturates,
par for course sandtrap engulfs,

chaos reverberates within
besieged cerebral corridor,
quotidian mental onslaught
spurns refugee exodus,
psychological ploy asper...

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The burning lamp that never runs out of oil,
The burning fire that never burns,
 anything so seriously like a bush fire.
The ageless fire that never dies out,
but shines so brightly up in the sky.

It has...

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Before grandma went to sleep
and snored softly as a baby sheep,
I had a grand wish to become a prince
and marry in a castle a beautiful princess,
but to make it come true
I need some magic beans...

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