Editor’s note: “No man is an island entire of itself/every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main...” wrote John Donne, whose death anniversary falls on March 31. However, amid the shared threat of a global pandemic, as we practise social distancing and seek refuge in the self, we may see ourselves as islands unto ourselves, rafting along the sea of life. As reports of people dying of coronavirus around the world come in, all of us at The Punch Magazine feel diminished as we are “involved in mankind”.  

COVID-19 destroys lives, but as human race, we have always created what is greater than us — literature. It’s a dark and difficult period in the march of human civilisation. But this is also the time that will produce the best of literature. “What one writer can make in the solitude of one room is something no power can easily destroy,” Salman Rushdie once said. Poets and writers throughout history have always shaped the world, and stopped it from “going to sleep”. Someday, when all this is over, the world may not be the same, and we may have lost millions of our loved ones to the contagion, but, by then, poets and writers who are witness to this moment in history will have created life-affirming literature that will outlive us. We do hope that this phase proves to be just a “short sleep” and that we may soon “wake eternally” and emerge into the light — stronger and well-healed.   

This poem is part of our world poetry special issue, with a focus on Turkey, curated by Ceyda  Elgül, an instructor of translation at Department of Translation and Interpreting Studies (DTIS), BoÄŸaziçi University in Bebek (Istanbul). It presents a selection of poems translated during a workshop in Turkey last year. 

Curator’s Note: Poetry is generally associated with untranslatability. Poets are assumed to deconstruct and refashion the language, which eventually puts it in a state that cannot be replicated in another language. This portrayal would seemingly suggest that poems are “islands” that have no contact with “other shores”. 

In July 2019, a group of professional poets, translators, and scholars from different linguistic and cultural backgrounds gathered at Büyükada, the largest of the nine “Princes’ Islands” in the Sea of Marmara, near Istanbul, to start a series of poetry translation workshops entitled “Island in Translation”. The gathering aimed to celebrate poetry translation as collaborative-creative production. A selection of island poets and/or poems with island themes was translated. The poets and the poems came from the Princes’ Islands (Istanbul), Cyprus, the Caribbean, and the Isle of Man. During the two-day workshop, the gathering delved into island literature from the viewpoint of translation and proposed corresponding images for island-poems in other languages, including English, Turkish, Korean, Kurdish, and Japanese. Metaphorically speaking, the group explored how “island-poems” and “other-shores” could be brought together. 

Besides this poem by Turkish poet-actor-visual artist Erkut Tokman (translated by Mark David Wyers and Ceyda Elgül), other translations include poems by late Caribbean poet, playwright and theatre director Derek Walcott (translated by Özlem Berk Albachten); Turkish writer-stage director-theatre critic Melisa Gürpınar (translated by Ceyda Elgül); Turkish poet-essayist-novelist Enis Batur (translated by Saliha Paker); Sait Faik Abasıyanık, one of the major short story writers in Turkish literature in the 20th century (translated by Åžehnaz Tahir GürçaÄŸlar and Ä°ldar Gün GürçaÄŸlar); Isle of Man-based English teacher Usha Kishore (translated by Seyhan Bozkurt Jobanputra and Rakesh Jobanputra); Özdemir Asaf, an eminent figure of contemporary Turkish Literature (translated by Seyhan Bozkurt Jobanputra and Rakesh Jobanputra); American poet Mel Kenne (translated by Mark David Wyers, Ä°dil KaracadaÄŸ and Gökçenur Ç.), another Turkish poet Haydar Ergülen (translated by Mark David Wyers and Ä°dil KaracadaÄŸ); Turkish-Cypriot poet Mehmet Yaşın (translated by Bilal Çelik and BaÅŸak Ergil); Turkish poet Muzaffer Tayyip Uslu  (translated by Muazzez Uslu); and Turkish poets Efe Duyan, Nihat Özdal and ÇaÄŸla Meknuze (translated by Gökçenur Ç.). In respect of the long tradition of poetry translation, the translations are presented along with the source poems so as to enable parallel reading.

“The Woman of the Seas” (Trans. Mark Wyers and Ceyda Elgül), The Voice Roaming the Unknown (Bilinmezi DolaÅŸan Ses), Yitik Ülke Publishing, 2007.

Sonbahar rüzgârlarını getirdi kucağında

gececi yakamozlar düÅŸerken yüreÄŸine

bir kedi gibi adımladı zamanı

midyenin belleÄŸinde,

yosun baÄŸlamış düÅŸlerine terk etti acılarını

Denizlerin Kadını

Doğa uyanırdı bedeninde,

eski bir teknede ölüm uyurdu

martıların tünediÄŸi,

manastır sessizliğinde bir papazın evi

domuzlarını beslediği,

bir mezarlık gibi konuşurdu tepede

Deniz yaÅŸlandı dedi bugün de kadın;

balıkçıların hüznü düÅŸtü kızıl tepelere,

kırlangıçlar gibi göç ettik yalnızlığımızdan

korkunç bir çağın ta içine..

Dalgalar rüzgârla bir baÅŸka seviÅŸti

kayalıklarda yankılandı ses

bir insanın çığlığı martınınkinden de tez

delip geçti zamanı,

eski bir anıya

kristal bir aynadan dokundu bakışları,

insanlığın kutsal törenine

Denizlerin Kadını

Ä°mam’a dert yandı bir fakir adalı

adaklar adadı taÅŸ taÅŸ üstüne

ipliklerle bağladı ağacı,

tutsak kalsın diye acılar batıl bir bilmecede,

unutarak Kuran’ı namazı evde

elinde hediyelerle bir manastıra daldı…

ÜÅŸüdü kayalıklarda gün

deniz bir açıp bir örtünce üstünü kıyılarında;

bahçelerde ve evlerde unutuldu

yaz esintilerinin ılıklığı,

bağışlandı ayazmalarda, kutsal sularda

Rum kızlarının günahları

Balıkları çamaşır asar gibi dizdi iplere

Denizlerin Kadını

Uskumru

             Cırcır

                     Lapina

vajinasından çıkmış bir bebek gibi

kayarken aÄŸlarından teknelerine balıkçıların

elleriyle temizledi kılçıklarından

nefretini sardunya uygarlığın

Şeytan uyurdu toprakta, eski bir mezarlıkta,

boyaları dökülmüÅŸ bir köÅŸkün kapısından

süzülürken giz

mavi göklere, martılara 

ÅŸarkı söylerdin sen deniz

Bir musiki gibi dinledi geceyi kadın

şahlanıyordu dalgalar

kırmızı bir şarabı hatırlatıyordu karanlık

bir fırtınanın yılgın öfkesinde

kadın daha saÄŸlam kazaklar örüyordu bebelerine,

yemeÄŸi beklerken tencerede

bir çaÄŸ kaynıyordu cadı kazanında

ölülerin sarhoÅŸluÄŸunda

Denizlerin Kadını

hâlâ örüyor balıkçıların aÄŸlarını

adıyor

ölmekte olan doÄŸanın dengesine

günah çıkartan ÅŸarkılarını

Papaz

        Ä°mam

               Haham

Devir-i terk, 

Dünya Manastırı