LİFE İS A LONG POEM
I was, without Toys … Fields extending indefinitely in an Anatolian village were my toys … clouds passing by fast above them were my dreams. Lying on my back with both arms extended staring at them … to each one attaching another dream. Then I discovered letters. Long … thin … vertical … truncated … leaning … with dots. Each letter with a different shape … different sound … different magic. Coming together those majestic meanings … melodies … ellipses … expansions.
There, I’ d found my toys..! Besides, to purchase them I did not have to think if my father’ s finances were sufficient, or not If they broke I was not going to be scolded by any ones..
Oh! like a miracle they were spread before my hands. Outside them I needed nothing. Whenever I went they were with me. When I was melancholy or joyful they were with me ready to give tongue to everything I said.
I grew up in a culture where saying too much was considered a shame because of that I never had enough letters to utter what I said in long sentences. but I had extended pains … extended longings … extended loves.
“ If I cry, will you be able to touch my tears?’ Orhan Veli was saying. In the very first poem I read, I could touch his … … even the Istanbul I never saw.
Poetry was a spell. the only kind of writing that could directly touch the heart. and to touch I began to write. but first, touching my heart. Touching there, anyhow, letters by themselves began their journey.
I was alone. but writing I multiplied. first I multiplied in myself … then in those who touched my writing.
Life is a large book … a long poem … that I am,... and will keep reading.
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