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27/06/2025
A BİRHAN KESKİN "TETRALOGY" IN TRANSLATION
An exclusive selection translated by Hande Eagle from the Turkish originals titled, "Soğuk Kazı" (2014) and "Fakir Kene" (2016), both published by Metis Publishing, Istanbul.
Photo © Seçkin Tercan
Although Birhan Keskin published her first poem in 1984, the year I was born, I only discovered her poetry through Soğuk Kazı in the summer of 2012. When I read her verse, it hit me like a hammer, struck a sore chord in me. Keskin's lines resonated so deep within me that I carried her books with me from Istanbul to East Anglia, and from there to the north of Italy. My initial clumsy and shy attempt at trying to translate a poem by Keskin was encouraged by Mel Kenne, whom I was fortunate enough to get to know through my participation in the Cunda International Workshop for Translators of Turkish Literature. In the summer of 2016, I dare to work on an English translation of Keskin's poem titled, "Parmağımda bir mavi yüzük" with Mel. The resulting co-translation was published in Turkish Poetry Today in 2017 (p.55). As it goes, once you start you cannot stop. Translating poetry has become one of my healthy addictions.
Almost a decade after that experience of trying my hand at translating Keskin, I am now ecstatic to publish on Live the Questions Now, an exclusive selection which I have decided to categorise as a "tetralogy", a compound work that is made up for four distinct works. Don't ask me why I chose these four works to translate, I don't have an answer to that other than how they make me feel and how much I have allowed myself to wallow in them. These four tragic works thread through the human condition like a sewing needle stitching over and under an endless garment; the human fabric. During the translation process, I found myself sighing and sobbing whilst hosting a ponderous stone in my gut. Nervous, anxious, distraught, then doubtful with sweaty palms and tingly fingers; encased and consumed by eternal doubt. Thank you, dear Birhan, for making me feel so alive while thinking about death up-close and personal.
ABOUT BİRHAN KESKİN
Born in 1963 in Kırklareli, Birhan Keskin graduated from the Department of Sociology of the Faculty of Letters at Istanbul University in 1986. Keskin published her first poem in 1984. From 1995 to 1998, she published the magazine titled, "Göçebe" with her friends. She worked as editor in various broadcasting institutions. Five of Keskin's books of published poetry from 1991 to 2002 were published in 2005 in a single volume titled, Kim Bağışlayacak Beni (Who'll Forgive Me) by Metis Publishing. Simultaneously published in 2005, Ba was awarded the 2006 Altın Portakal Şiir Ödülü (Golden Orange Poetry Prize). Soğuk Kazı (2010) was awarded the Metin Altıok Şiir Ödülü (Metin Altıok Poetry Prize). In 2013, Arc Publications published &Silk&Love&Flame, a collection of Birhan Keskin's poems translated by George Messo, with an introduction by Amanda Dalton. Metis Publishing continues to publish Birhan Keskin's complete works.
Bırak bırak
Bırak o kordonu dedin, bıraktım ve çıktım dünyaya
İlk zorluğu buyurdun, memeyi bırak dedin,
uzun emdimdi eminim.
Köyü bırakıyoruz dediydi baban bıraktı hepinizi şehire
Saçını bırak, dedi annen berberde her sabah zor olur
Her gün taraması, başlarken ilkokula.
Ne berberi unuttun ne o günü.
O gün bügün saçın bir anlamı yok sende, arada zülüf filan
desen de şiirde.
İlkokul öğretmenin sol elini beğenmedi, bırak dedi,
Solak ne örtmenim diyemeden bıraktın kalemi sağ eline.
Çocuklar travmatik oluyorlarmış boşanınca babayla anne
O ne ki, bizimkiler kaç evi başımıza yıktılar her mahallede.
İlk arkadaşın nurcan; sana göre, yaşına göre
Onun esmerliğiyle sevdiydin geceyi de,
ilk ayrılığındı, işte bak, bırak dedi sana,
bıraktın oyun arasında, anlamadın bile.
Feneri yak gidelim mavilim, sonra... ne bileyim, onca hırgür,
Anlamadım neler bıraktım ilkgençllik yıllarında ralarda ralarda.
Okulu bırak diyen bir şeytan da olmuştu arada, saymalı onu da.
Sonra büyü dedin, büyüdük.
Uza dedin uzadık. Boylu boyunca.
Elimi büktüğün yetmedi belimi büktün,
Bırak dedin basketi, bıraktım.
Beş olması gereken yerde dört omur varmış
Niye eksik ben ne bileyim, sen taktın?
Al bak sana şiir dedin,
Onu beşinci omur yerine taktım.
İlk aşkımdı, nasıldı dersen, ilk fasıldı, asıldı,
Bu şiirin başındaki süt gibiydi, bırakması.
Onu bırak dedin ya. Ah ne zordu. Bir vapur iskelesinde,
turnikenin öbür yanında.
Gözümü açtığımda elektroşok veriyorlardı eksiğimin
yerine.
Gençlik işte onu bırak bunu bırak, serseri misin, bırak
Diye diye, bıraktıklarını dizemezsin,
Vesselam lale sümbül bağın
bırak bırak, bitmiyordu düzünden bu hayat.
Kısa kestim bu bölümdeki yılları, uzun bıraktırmıştım çünkü.
Kompile mistik ol dedi biri, kimdi, bir ara unuttum kendimi
Oysa hayattı bu, buradaydı, ben buradaydım, yoktu yeri
Basitti yaşamak. Yaşarsın ve kemiklerini bırakırsın geri.
Hayattı, hayatımızdı, olgun bir meyveye benziyor gibiydik ileri geri
Baktım bırak dedin babanın elini, babam sana gitti,
Ondan kalan boşlukla epey büyüdüm, inanmazsan işte!
İşte o meşenin altı, on yıldır yok, işte burada yokluğunun yeri.
Onca yıldan
Onca bıraktıklarımdan sonra
Ben şimdi sana
Bırak beni, bırak beni dersem
Ve sen
Beni bırakırsan var ya
Beni bırakırsan var ya!
Birhan Keskin, Fakir Kene (Poor Tick), Metis Publishing, Istanbul, 2016, p. 53-55.
Let go let go
You said, let go of that cord, I did and came out into the world
You commanded the first challenge, let go of the breast, you said
I must have suckled for long, no doubt.
Your father had said, we’re letting go of village life, left you all in the city
Your mother said, let go of your hair, at the barber, too hard to comb
every morning, as you started primary school.
You forgot neither the barber nor that day.
Even if now and then in your lines you mention lovelocks and such
Hair has been meaningless to you ever since that day.
Your primary school teacher didn’t like your left hand, she said, let go,
You let the pencil into your right hand before you could ask, what’s a leftie teach?
They say, when parents divorce kids are traumatised
As if that’s something! How many homes did ours wreck in every hood, I lost count.
Your first mate nurcan; is perfect for you, age-right,
Through her darkness you learned to love the night,
It was your first separation, here, she said to you, let go
Clueless, yet while, playing you let go.
Light up that lantern, let’s go blue beauty¹, then... what do I know, all that squabble.
How many things I let go of in my teens, all meaningless both then and now.
At one point there was a devil who said, sod school, got to add that into the mix.
Then you said, grow, so we did.
You said beat it, we did. Far and long.
You twisted my wrist, it wasn’t enough, you broke my back,
You said, give up basketball, so I did.
I had only four vertebrae where there should’ve been five, they said,
Why am I missing one, who knows, but didn’t you go on and on about it?
Here you go, you said, poetry for you,
I put it in place of my missing vertebra.
My first love, if you ask how that was, I’d say it was the first act, essential,
And to let go, was like letting go of the milk at the start of this poem.
Remember, you said, let go of it. Oh, how harsh that was... On a ferry port,
Parted by a turnstile.
When I opened my eyes, they’d hooked me up to electro-shock
to replace the missing me.
Youth, as they say, is all let go of this, let go of that... you a punk?
Just ‘cos you said let go, you cannot line on a string what you let go
That’s it, flower meadows and vineyards
Let go, let go, and life never did give me a fair go.
I cut short the years in this chapter, because you’d made me keep them so long.
Turn into a total mystic, said someone but who, for a while I forgot who I was
Though this was life, it was here, I was here, it had no other place
Living was easy. You live and leave your bones behind.
It was life, our life, we looked a lot like ripe fruit, two steps forward one back
I looked, let go of your father’s hand, you said, and my father joined you.
In the void left by him I grew up some, if you don't believe me, come and see!
Well, nothing has grown under this oak for a decade, see, your absence is right here.
After all those years,
After all that I let go,
If I now tell you to,
Let go of me, let go of me,
And you...
Should you let go of me, woe is me
Should you let go of me, woe is me!
1 This is a reference to a Turkish folk song titled, “Mavilim Mavileşelim”.
Gazze
Senden kalkıp başka ellere gidemem.
Rüzgâr ve kuytu.
Yağmur ve uykuyduk birbirimize
Aklına geldikçe viran teknelerinde
Sev beni.
Gazze’de hava bulutlu on yedi derece
Nem yüzde 16, rüzgâr saatte 13 kilometre
Saldırıda ondokuzuncu gün, yirminci gece.
Ölü sayısı binin üstünde, yaralı binlerce.
Şimdi önüme dört çöl fotoğrafı koydum.
Dört mecaz olsun diye serin, kanlı dünyaya
Duygusal konuşmak için şairler var diyor,
Okkadar dallama birileri tv’de Gazze üstüne
Yağmurda karda doluda iki kere sev beni,
Altüst edilmiş cümleyim ben senin elinde
Zalimin rişte-i ikbalini bin ah bile bazen
Kesmiyor, gördün işte, delik deşiğim ben.
Naylonlara bezlere sarmışlar, büyümeden...
Büyümeden allahım bakamam,
Bakamam onlara... onlar mermiden,,,
Bu çocuklar korrrrrrkunç
Vurulmuş allahım.
İnsan; insan ne ki,
Şeytanın bacağı kırık kalıyor
İnsan derken.
Birhan Keskin, Soğuk Kazı (Cold Dig), 2014, Metis Publishing, p. 56-57.
Gaza
I cannot up and leave you to others.
Breezy and sheltered.
Rain and sleep we were to one another
If you happen to remember me at dervish lodges in ruin
Love me.
In Gaza the weather is overcast seventeen degrees Celsius,
Humidity 16 percent, gale force 13 kilometres per hour.
The nineteenth day of assault, the twentieth night.
More than a thousand dead, injured thousands.
I place four photographs of the desert in front of me.
As four metaphors for this cool, blooded world.
Poets are for people who want to talk romance
That’s what some downright prick says on TV about Gaza.
When it rains, snows, hails love me twice,
In your hand I am a sentence turned end to start.
Even a thousand sighs cannot sever a tyrant’s cord of happiness at times,
see, I’m bullet-riddled.
Wrapped in plastic and in cloth, before they could grow
Before they could grow, I cannot look at them oh almighty,
I cannot look at them... They are made of bullets,,,
These kids have been horrrrrrrrrendously
gunned down oh almighty.
Human; what’s a human,
You break the devil’s leg
Just when you say human.
Cover design by Semih Sökmen
Cover design by Semih Sökmen
Flamingo I
Daha kalkarken, bir anı
İnce ve pembe
Bir gölden öbürüne.
Bir cümle, kısacık, koşar adım,
Yok karşılayanı.
Yakar seni öyle.
Sonra benden sana kalan
Bir tuzlu su ve incecik
Boynumun hatırası,
Kıldan ince.
Flamingo II
Öyle çoktum bir gün
Nakuru’da.
Sonra evden uzağa.
Bacaklarım öyle ince öyle pembe
Bir tuzlu suda,
Öyle çoktum bir gün
Su bir hatıra Nakuru’da
...
Ben bir durgun suda,
Bir tuzlu tavada yaşıyorum
Ben,
Onlar diyorlarkidiyorlarki bana,
Şeker söyle kaymak söyle
Bal söyle!
Flamingo III
Hayatta değdiğim yer bir tuz zerresi
Kirpiklerimde kırılan ses tuzun sesi
Tuz bastım kalbime sakladım seni
Yürüdüğüm ömrüm değil, keskin
bir tuz hikâyesi.
Birhan Keskin, Soğuk Kazı (Cold Dig), 2014, Metis Publishing, p. 20-22.
Flamingo I
Just as I woke up, a memory
Slender and pink
From one lake to another.
A sentence, fleeting, on the double,
With no one to receive it.
It burns you whole.
Then what remains of me in you
Is salt water and a memory of
my wispy neck,
thinner than a strand of hair.
Flamingo II
One day
In Nakuru, I was so fed up.
And then of being far from home.
My legs so thin so pink
In salt water.
I was so fed up
Water is only a memory in Nakuru.
…
In stagnant water
In a pan of salt
I live,
They are tellingmetellingme,
Ask for sugar, ask for clotted cream
Ask for honey!
Flamingo III
A grain of salt is where I touch life
That breaking sound on my eyelashes is that of salt
I preserved you as I rubbed salt into my heart
It's not my life that I am walking through, but a sharp
story of salt.
A translation of the chapter titled, "Cümle Kapısı" ("The Open Gate") as published in Fakir Kene, 2016, pp. 67-77.
My Aunt Zehra
To Hayriye
My aunt Zehra, who was actually my mother’s aunt, was more of an aunt to me. Because Hayriş was my peer. Hayriş was like a sister to me. From our teens on, we were friends, more than that, like siblings. In the streets of Feriköy, in that old milk pudding shop. In the evening, we would almost always meet up at the home of one of the girls. We were a large group of sporty girls all together. We were adolescents, then teenagers, we were impregnable. We’d blunder a lot, make her really angry, one day we even knocked down the stovepipe at her house, (years later I found out that the stovepipe was knocked over by Saadet, who had an imaginary lover and she mistook the pipes for her lover Adem, and when she hugged them the pipes came apart and toppled over). At her house in Feriköy. We were all rascals. She’d feed us all. She’d put up with all our troubles. That’s why she was more my auntie than my mother’s. In her deep green eyes, affection and dignity took turns rippling. A beautiful fair woman... Even in her old age, she was beautiful. Her eyes are still as stunning as ever. Her facial features..., but I think what was actually reflected in her eyes was the rippling of her heart... Her heart was her most beautiful attribute, the one that never withheld her affection from us.
I learnt from her what it means to feed everyone. From her hands I learnt what flavour means. Whatever she cooked would be the most delicious dish in the whole world. Later, when she moved to Mecidiyeköy how many countless dishes she cooked for us in the backyard. Countless delectables.
After all the years we spent together with my aunt Zehra, we had such memorable hundred days that I cannot liken it to any other period of my life. With her, we waited for a long, drawn-out death. Like waiting for a mystery to reveal itself. Woefully. We placed our woes in our palms to concealconcealconceal... to seal it shut, to prohibit entry.
- I’m so happy that you came... See, there’s nothing to fear, nothing to run away from... I know you are terrified of illness, but don’t run away from it, learn a little about death as well. Inside me, there’s an open gate, you have no idea how peaceful I am, I come prepared... There’s an open gate ahead of me. So, don’t stand on your toes, all right?
- Do you reckon Uncle Kemal is waiting for you beyond it?
- He never came to me in my dreams.
- Must you see him in your dreams for him to wait for you there at the gate.
- Did he love you dearly?
- He did... he did. And so dearly too.
- Then he’ll be there to greet you, don’t worry.
- Bah! Never mind your uncle, I would like women to greet me, like at the ladies’ hammam.
- Sure, of course, that way it would be merrier, majority of them are already there anyway. My grandmother has probably rounded up the whole team there, no? There’s still time. A long time. You hang in there. Look at your hands, auntie, are they the hands of someone who is about to die, for the love of God, look how soft they are, like silk.
- They’ve turned yellow, don’t you see, all yellow... (just then the oxygen tube in her nose fell off, I put it back in).
- Nooo, not at all, look how beautiful they are silky, look how good they smell... I was just responding to console you, caressing your hand, you fell asleep.
- I wonder how we know when it's time to die. What happens between life and death that we die in the end? How is the die cast? How does the spirit bid farewell to the skin? My auntie.
Hayrişşş! Hey! Auntie has fallen asleep again.
Hayriş, last night I had a strange dream... You know, I barely ever remember my dreams. Though I remember this one clear as day, I should tell it to you before I forget so I can keep it on my mind. Listen now. I’d gone somewhere, you know how the world is round, well, I was in some country towards the bottom half of the globe.
I had gone to the worst possible city in a country otherwise renowned for its beauty. Bearing a strange sense of disappointment, I am looking at the city from above, from a hilltop. With me there is a relatively young chap, I don’t know who he is. Together, we are gazing at the city from above. There are ugly buildings in the city, it looks like... in some ways it looks like Latin America, but it wasn’t. We are either somewhere up in the very north or down in the very south, the sky is heavily overcast, and it is thus that I gather we are near some endpoint on earth. Somewhere on the coast of an ocean. As we watch the city from the hilltop we see thousands upon thousands of people gathered on a vast plain below, there’s a tremendous demonstration, but we don’t know exactly what is going on. Slowly we head down from the hill to the city. As we get closer to the city, the tide begins to pick up and starts moving in closer towards us... then the tide grows into humongous waves, a tsunami spilling ferociously into the land where we are. I thought I could float on top of the waves, had they been coming from one direction, I could somehow synchronise my movements with the waves and manage to stay on top. Who’s the young guy next to me, perhaps my animus. I am not alone in the dream. He’s also in the waves with me. It seems that we could get by. But just as we try to pull ourselves out of a gigantic wave, ripples form from different directions and undercurrents, and I am unable to rise to the surface, the young guy is also struggling... We are right in the middle of that group of waves just as I am about to surface... You know that young guy, I keep my eyes on him, wondering if he will be able to make it out... But then we are submerged, I wonder if he'll make it... In the end we squeezed ourselves into a fine vortex formed amidst the crashing waves, and came out onto the surface... Just as soon as we poked our heads out of the water, the dream ended. I woke up. Isn’t it very strange, very peculiar? Why do I, who can never remember a dream, recall this dream so vividly, Hayriş?
(...)
- Auntie, sshhh auntie. I’m here.
- Let her sleep, cousin. That’s how it is, she keeps nodding off. Off into deep sleep. Last night there was a moment when I couldn’t tell if she was comatose or sleeping. I panicked and called an ambulance. The doctor said she’s sleeping. All the doctors who come to see her are shocked that she’s still alive. She didn’t fail to surprise the ones who came last night.
- Auntie! Sshhh, aunt Zehra, where are you?
- Don’t talk to my mother like that, cuz.
- What’s wrong with the way I talk to her; she is your mother and my aunt Zehra. I talk to her the way I like, it’s none of your business.
The rain is the one thing that never falls down alone. Don’t believe those who tell you it falls down alone. The rain is the most crowded thing I’ve ever known. There’s no difference between rain like starling murmurations in the sky, and starling murmurations like the rain. All right, go ahead, and sleep now.
- What on earth are you mumbling on about?
- What’s it to you, anyhow?
The sky is a sort of impossibility, my dear Hayriye, at least for those who are down to earth. That is exactly why I prefer the phrase "celestial sphere" to describe it. I’ve always understood celestial sphere - and not the sky - to be a place of affection, that’s how I’ve associated it. Sphere... Beautiful isn’t it, how affectionate. So sonorous...
Soon after I lost my father I had a dream. And in that dream, the celestial sphere had sides, the sky was an elliptical dome. From the celestial sphere my father had dropped an element or something metal unknown to me. After I picked up that thing that fell down for me and twiddled with it for a bit, I’d turned it into a ring to put on my finger [1].
(...)
- Auntie, keep quiet, don’t tire yourself out. I’ll talk and you nod, all right?
- I’m so happy to see you.
- Me too, auntie, I’m happy to see you at every visit. You stay quiet, I’ll talk. Today your eyes are bright as the sky.
- I have two angels. These... (She points at Hayriş and Figen). They are my dearest.
- You must be so tired of always holding Hayriş’s hand! Let me hold your hands for a while.
- I’m really curious to find out if I’ll be conscious when I die. Wait and see, Hayriye, wait and see.
- Mum, I can’t believe that this is what you’re thinking about! If you are not conscious, you won’t know it anyhow. We... What strange thoughts occur to
you!
- I'm always lying down, that’s probably why!
(...)
- All right, look, I’ll count your prayer beads for you. You can recite the prayers under your breath. I’ll count them according to the movement of your lips. We can work as corporate executives do. All right? Do we have a deal? Haha! I made you laugh, didn’t I? Does it hurt to laugh up your sleeve? If it does, nod and I won’t make you laugh anymore. Stop, stop, don’t nod, your tube is falling out. You don’t get pissed off that we are a little sassy now and then, right auntie?
- Sassy! Hah! I am the queen of sass! It’s been two months, and I still haven’t kicked the bucket.
- All right auntie, I’ll start telling the beads... There’s no room for error with prayer beads! Let’s begin.
(...)
- Is it you?
- Yes, auntie, I’m here now.
- I am so happy to see you.
- How are you today?
- I don’t know if I am down on earth or up in the sky.
- I don’t know if I am down on earth or up in the sky.
- These angels of yours really cherish you, don’t they? That’s why you don’t know whether you are down on earth or up in the sky. You know these, your angels, they are bionic.
- And what of me? Of me? See, it’s been three months, I still haven’t kicked the bucket.
- May God spare you, what a thing to say auntie!
All right auntie. You sleep. I’ll talk. May God spare you... let you live long. In a way, you are bionic too, but your body looks more like a haiku with each passing day. If you could hear me now, you’d ask what a haiku is. Never mind auntie, it’s a foreign thing. A Japanese thing, never mind. But a beautiful thing like cherry blossom in season. Waiting for death is a mournful exhaustion. Our souls have transformed into some other thing with the fear and restlessness of death that we look to and focus on and that is looming over us and will one day come. Living is not normally like that, auntie, I am not sure if we’d known it to be so until now. There, up ahead there is a kind of hidden knowledge, it’s called death. Step by step, you lead us to that hidden knowledge through mourning. But, oh, you submit to it with such ease. Only wrecks and crazies submit to it so easily, auntie.
(...)
All right auntie, I found it, really, I found that song. It’s on this CD; I’ll play it for you now. Songül would have sung this song to you, you could have asked her to. But this woman sings it well too, you’ll enjoy it. If you encounter Sabite Tur Gülerman on the other side, you should definitely ask her to sing it.
(...)
- Hayriş, tell me, what if there’s no other side!
- So be it, who cares! Isn’t this side enough?
- If it were would we be talking about the other side, eh? For us humans it’s only ever enough if there’s more than what we need. The other side... eh!
- I’ll take a swig of this antidepressant; do you want some?
- You know I only partake in chemical antidepressants.
- I know, I thought I’d just ask in case you wanted a glass.
- What do you think about the other side?
- What can I say, girl, this side is more than enough for me, don’t you see...
- So when auntie dies, what if they don’t greet her on the other side... that’s what I’m wondering.
- Are you all right up there?
- I’m talking nonsense, never mind. Still, I’m just talking to you, it's between us. What if we don’t have souls, what the hell are we going to do, eh!
- Pfff, cuz, let it be. I’ve a soul. You’ve been gnawing at it since lunch.
Here, here, look, here's my soul.
(...)
- What’s up cousin, you seem a bit odd today...
- I’ve no idea, Hayriş. I saw you in my dream all last night, I’m a bit off today.
- Did you see me in your dream?
- In a way I saw you, but actually I saw auntie dying.
- How? Tell me...
- I can’t, I can’t tell you. There’s no way of describing it. Just a frame. Never mind.
- Tell me, cousin, I’m used to it, really. This woman has gotten me used to death. If the day after tomorrow I don’t seem sad enough at the funeral, I won’t
know how to explain it. You lot can pretty please explain it to all the others.
- Whatever, stop rambling. Figen should stay here. We can drink some tea downstairs. Come on.
---------------------------------
In my dream Hayriş was running down the stairs from the first floor where my aunt was staying. That was all the action in my dream, it was brief. If you were to adapt it to screen, and you know that one second is 24 frames, my dream wasn’t even 24 frames long, it lasted a split second. My aunt had died and Hayriye was running down the stairs, she was grieved. Hayriş’s heart was on fire, and that was reflected on her smog-covered face. Looking at her face, I knew her heart was on fire. That’s how short my dream was.
------------------------------------
My fair-eyed auntie today marks the sixteenth day since we saw you off beautifully. What does it mean, to see off someone beautifully? Whatever has happened, whether there was a beautiful side to it, it had nothing to do with us, but rather to do with you. And now that you’re gone, don’t you dare think that we won’t be talking to you anymore. For instance, I will always be counting prayer beads in memory of your beautiful death. I will never forget that great gift you gave me as you died.
Now I’ll recount to you what you were wondering about. Then we can bid farewell for once and all.
You know how you were wondering if you would be unconscious at your moment of death... Yes, the doctors informed us that about eight hours before you died you lost consciousness. But I think that, it was a couple of hours before your last breath you consciously grasped tight Hayriş’s hand for the last time. Therefore, I am not certain you had really lost consciousness. I think you didn’t.
When I received the news and got to your house, you had died shy of an hour and a half before. We first sat downstairs for a while. Then I wanted to go upstairs to see you. Here comes the news flash. I had never stared death in the face before.
I had made a promise to you, and to myself. This time I would stare.
I was going to look at you. That was our agreement.
I took Olcay by the hand and we walked upstairs.
It wasn’t at all like what I feared. They had covered you with a chalk-white sheet, İsmet rolled down the top of the sheet and revealed your face. I looked at your face. I touched your hand; it was still warm. I touched your face. I can’t say I caressed it. I could only touch it. In that moment it felt as if you were both still there and already gone. You were still like my aunt Zehra and also like anything else. Something like dead but not dead. It could have been that plastic chair or you, no difference. The guardian of your life and your body had left, but where had it gone... That we don’t know. You’re lying down, I lean over you, your hand is extending towards my cheek as if you intend to caress it. I gaze at your hand, your hand that reaches out affectionately towards my cheek. A strangely photographic scene occurs to me. Your hand will never again reach out to my cheek. Hayriş had done everything exactly as you wished. You were worried that she wouldn’t be able to manage it all, but all your worries were in vain. If you could see all that she did after you died, you’d describe it as a “superb effort.” If it weren’t so, I wouldn’t be telling you all this with such ease. You made us all believe it would be easy. We had all prayed for an easy death for you. Frankly, it wasn’t hard. Life had parted from your body; I saw it for the first time with my own two eyes.
Then we buried you.
For me, the hardest part happened on the night of the sixteenth day after your death. Hayriş and I had dinner with a friend. We were going back home in a taxi, and as we talked about you, Hayriş put together a sentence. With that, Hayriş’s heart and body was shaken to the core. The pain that had been nailed into Hayriş, was nailed onto my shoulder, that’s when the ground shook. We got off the taxi.
On a midnight street we headed not for home but veered in a strange direction.
And the story which I thought I wrote with a pen, I finished that night with an ember stick that I held between my fingers. Suddenly, quickly.
I understood that I couldn’t write for long with ember.
I am now looking at a photo Hayriş took of me and you back in those days. You are lying down, I am leaning over you, your hand reaches out to caress my face. I keep looking at your hand. Your affectionate hand on my cheek...
- Auntie! But you!
- I didn’t die; I didn’t...
- How’s it possible... Tomorrow will mark the fortieth day since your death.
Translator's Footnotes:
[1] To me, there’s a vivid connection between this line and the poem titled, “Parmağımda bir mavi yüzük” (A blue ring on my finger, Fakir Kene, p. 61), which I co-translated with Mel Kenne and was published in Turkish Poetry Today in 2017.
[2] A Turkish folk song.
N.B: Cümle Kapısı is a concealed gateway that separates the harem of the Topkapı Palace from the Courtyard of the Eunuchs; thus concealing the actual door of the harem from direct sight. It is important to make note of this while reading this text as Aunt Zehra expresses a wish to be greeted by deceased women from her family at the gates of heaven. For the purposes of this translation, I chose to translate the chapter title "Cümle Kapısı" as "The Open Gate" because it denotes both the passage a deceased person experiences from material life to the afterlife and the way Aunt Zehra refers to it.
With special thanks to Birhan Keskin and Metis Publishing.
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