Orhan Veli

HÜRRİYETE DOĞRU

Language: turkish

Translations: english (TOWARD FREEDOM), german (Der Freiheit entgegen)

HÜRRİYETE DOĞRU

Gün doğmadan,
Deniz daha bembeyazken çıkacaksın yola.
Kürekleri tutmanın şehveti avuçlarında,
İçinde bir iş görmenin saadeti,
Gideceksin;
Gideceksin ırıpların çalkantısında.
Balıklar çıkacak yoluna, karşıcı;
Sevineceksin.
Ağları silkeledikçe
Deniz gelecek eline pul pul;
Ruhları sustuğu vakit martıların,
Kayalıklardaki mezarlarında,
Birden,
Bir kıyamettir kopacak ufuklarda.
Denizkızları mı dersin, kuşlar mı dersin;
Bayramlar seyranlar mı dersin, şenlikler cümbüşler mi?
Gelin alayları, teller, duvaklar, donanmalar mı?
Heeeey!
Ne duruyorsun be, at kendini denize;
Geride bekliyenin varmış, aldırma;
Görmüyor musun, her yanda hürriyet;
Yelken ol, kürek ol, dümen ol, balık ol, su ol;
Git gidebildiğin yere.

Orhan Veli

photo © Yapi Kredi Publishing

* 13.04.1914, Istanbul, Turkey
† 14.11.1950, Turkey

Orhan Veli was one of the most innovative poets in 20th-century Turkish Literature. He left Istanbul University in 1935 without having completed his studies. He worked in the Ankara Post Office until he was called up during World War II. On his discharge in 1945 he obtained a post as translator in the Ministry of Education but left his job after less than two years to lead a bohemian life.

His first poems were published in journals when he was a high school student. In 1941, he published a poem book entitled Garip/The Stranger with his high school friends, the poets Oktay Rifat and Melih Cevdet Anday, which launched a major poetry movement in the Turkish poetry tradition.
His legacy was that free verse, and an unlimited range of themes became the rule, while traditional meter became an anachronism. While discarding rhyme and meter, Orhan Veli expresses an almost nihilistic world view that placed him firmly in the company of the modern western man.

photo © Yapi Kredi Publishing

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