Out of past’s window I look at Ordu,
Out of preceding time to these moments and years!
Assuming I am existent in this dreamy world,
On an Autumn day, I take a stroll by the sea!…
I see friends of mine, from the same neighborhood;
Playing the match of double goal keepers in front of the pier
In the middle of the sea sails a grumbling
Maroon Black Sea boat…
Again as if it is today, seagulls fly over with their cries
The sea sits calm, still and silent to the finest
At the beach, making all the effort for an abundant fishing net;
Fishermen draw them
As if they smile, Taşbaşı’s white-washed adorable homes…
They are stringed in the bosom of Boztepe like pearls.
Tangerine trees in their orchards with stone walls;
Tangerines, like bright yellow gold in their branches!
These pretty gardens, these cute homes,
Unaware of the fact that a day will arrive;
Ungracious giants of a concrete jungle,
Shall be erected ruthlessly in their place!…
Out of past’s window I look at Ordu…
As if I am seeing a dream belonging to those years
Whatever interpretations we make for better, it is nothing more than a dream
Hang-on Market for one day turned into a fair
Women coming from villages
Sell their butter, yogurt, beets, herbs,
Eggs, chickens, cherry laurel, and mushrooms
Nuri Çavuş again furious,
Coming down on a person who messed up the place.
A tradesman in the market buys some butter from a villager
While counting his Money,
The villager says, ‘you are putting too much for the tare!’
Then a voice is being raised,
From the side of İspirli’s bakery…
This is Blind Osman with kemencha,
Villagers form a loop, listening to him.
A folk song he wrote;
For the young man, he was shot last month in the coal market
Pouring curses for the assassin, whose hands are in blood…
Melodies moan in the strings of kemencha,
Grandmas weep, their handkerchiefs in their hands…
When the lament was voiced on the one hand,
Carrier with the radio, the Korean, a bundle of papers in his hand
Selling the epic of the bride who was dumbfounded
When her mother-in-law was getting hatcheted in Gürgentepe.
He narrates this fabricated event as if it is true.
Crazy Abdullah is again hot headed:
Swearing by saying ‘is it possible?’,
Master Harun working hard, whipping the ice-cream.
Is it likely that the ones who hang out there would not taste it?
Harun’s ice-cream is just like honey and cream!…
Waterman Hasbi, in white conical hat, decorous copper pitcher in his back;
Crying out with all his might.
Calling on the ones whose hearts ache.
‘Drink ice. Drink it in Çobanbağırtan!’
Even you put in ice into the tap water,
Could it turn into a mountain pasture’s water?
Another peddler advertises
‘Sharp louse medicine, horn combs,
Underpants with twenty strings, DDT even!’
Wandering around, a buyer to find the market…
‘It reads!!!’ a paper selling child cries,
As if there is a piece of flash news
However, the devil boy arranges his own nursery rhyme
Instead of what is written there:
It reads,
Akif’s boat,
Crazy Emin’s churn,
Keçiköylü’s sober man,
Mustache of Mehmet from Unye!…
Out of past’s window I look at Ordu,
I see a haste from the gone years!…
The fuss about the hazelnut in August months
Sick Mustafa and Osman, the master of the snakes
Two competing headmen to share the market laborers…
Come off from Gölköy, Gürgentepe, Aybastı, Korgan
A basket in their hands, and a quilt in their back
In Köprübaşı, all hazelnut laborers keep their space
Some brought their wives, kids, even their old mothers;
They await the owners of the orchards in the Yürürler’s Inn!…
However, in a little while at the hazelnut orchards,
Many songs will be chanted, written
With joy, who knows how many bullets will be shut in the air
August is called a month of man;
Once hazelnut arrives in the harvest
Then even a languid cat owns some
Though there are many!…
Eying on the hazelnut money;
With the tent theater, the flying swing is in place,
In the People’s Plain already
Out of past’s window I look at Ordu
I see so many hopes from gone years
Twisting among hazelnut orchards,
On the narrow muddy road of the village
One student with his black rubber shoes
Going down to the city with his bundle in his hand
Yogurt bucket is in his other hand
Though his face looks at the city
His mind stays in his village anyway
He is for sure going to a junior high school;
A school cap with yellow ribbon in his head
Alas, even now he feels
Longing for his granny!
Yogurt in his bucket, in his bundle;
Skim-milk cheese, pickles and some corn bread
It is his a week-long food
In a rent ramshackle city room!…
Yet he is moving towards hope,
You may think he runs…
In every step he takes, as if he clears a hurdle!…
Out of past’s window I look at Ordu;
So many people I see from those years gone
As if they are seeping drop by drop through fine muslin
From this pretty city, they migrated to that world
Their fleshes turned into an imagination;
Their pictures are here and there
Now their names engraved in their headstones…
When I remember them with a sour smile and mercy;
Always I feel the words of that song in me:
‘Everything except death is a lie’
And then I find myself saying
‘It is a nice echo perpetuating in this dome’
Curtain!…
Translated From Turkish by Mesut Senol