In honor of the Commemoration of Ataturk, we present this work by one of modern Turkey’s fiercest poets.

 

when the angels bow down before the roses
with a force equal to that of the wave
the rose is in the body

pulling the stars out of dark nests
down into the deeps, the beds of moonlight
the voices that announce her,
the crimson within pain and faith-filled nights.

in everthing within everything
within no place in nothing
your heart an unheard and solitary collision
down in the depths of the ocean
but burning a thousand times carries the rooted fires
under skies where you
desired everything, where you thirsted.

whatever it is you craved to hear, or the hunger
dragging on from that first day craved to eat
is there, where the angels bow down;
and the rose is in the body.

Translation by Patrick Neil Doherty