OKTAY RIFAT
(1914-1988)

BOYS

He died, he doesn't know that he is
    dead.
His hands are at his sides, they'll carry
    him away,
He cannot say: 'I will not go'.
He couldn't taste the sweets and cakes,
He couldn't even thank the friends
Who carried off his coffin.
Ah, his death is not like someone else's!

Translated by Bernard Lewis
 

THANKSGIVING

I must give thanks
To my boots and my coat.
I must give thanks to the falling snow
To today, to this joy...
Thanks for having trodden the snow
Thanks to the sky and the earth
To the stars whose names I don't know-
Praise be to water and fire!

Translated by Bernard Lewis

SELF REVELATION

How hard is my ordeal!
I know no arithmetic
And I am employed in accounts.
My favorite dish is eggplant fried in oil
And it upsets me.
I know a freckled girl
I love her she doesn't love me.

Translated by Bernard Lewis

TO MY WIFE

Halls which are cool with you
Rooms which are light with you
A morning waking in your bed
To a day long with happiness.

We are halves of the same apple
Our day and night, our homes, are one.
The grass grows gladly where you step
Loneliness comes from the road where you've gone.

Translated by Larry Clark
 

PINK HOUSE ON THE BOSPHORUS

There are girls crisp as lettuce,
Their mouths and noses curved and curled,
They sit cross-legged on the ferries,
The wind blows, and when he looks
A man has glimpses which make his heart pound.

Oh Istanbul, old devil that you are!-
Down at Findikli there's fun and games.
A line in my hand with a hundred hooks
I plunge like the North with among the tunny
From Captain Turgut's boat.

I've never been to visit Orhan's grave
At Rumelihisar-
-I never want to go.
Now with fresh bread, a morsel of white cheese,
He'd be just here, who knows!
Drinking raki and watching the sea.

I leap from the quay to the water,
Fish below me
Clouds above,
The choppy Bosphorus laps by mouth;
And I swim straight to the pink house on the water's edge.

Translated by Richard McKane
 

THE FISHERMAN AND THE SEA

Yesterday the sea was silient,
today it's muttering.
tomorrow it could be raving and foaming,
but the fisherman who lives on his own
occasionally looks into space
and never talks for days on end.

Translated by Richard McKane
 
 
Oktay Rifat, is one of the most distinguished of 20th century Turkish poets. He was the son of the poet and linguist Samih Rıfat, who was also the governor of Trabzon. He attended Ankara High School for Boys (1932) and graduated from Ankara University, Faculty of Law (1936). He was appointed to Paris, France by the State Ministry to do his PhD, however came back after three years without completing his degree due to outbreak of World War II. Back in Istanbul he started to work at the General Directorate of Press and Publishing (1943) and as a legal practitioner in Ankara and İstanbul. He retired when he was still a legal adviser at Turkish State Railways, İstanbul Directorate Head Office (1961-73). His first poems were published in the review Varlık (1936-44), and he came to be known for his poems published in the reviews Aile (1947), Yaprak (1949-50) and Yeditepe (1951-57).
He became one of the pioneers of the movement called “New Poetry”, or “Strange” (Garip), with his poems published in the book Garip (Strange), which he published in collaboration with Orhan Veli Kanık and Melih Cevdet Anday in 1941.
He focused on social issues in his poems, in which he employed the features of folk poetry and thus reinvented himself. He followed the vogue of the surrealistic understanding of poetry like the other poets of the Second New movement. Besides poetry, he wrote plays and translated works from French. He collected the Yeditepe Poetry Prize in 1955 with Karga ile Tilki (The Crow and the Fox) and the Turkish Language Association Poetry Award in 1970 with his book Şiirler (Poems). His play Yağmur Sıkıntısı (Oppressive Air) was selected as the Best Play of the Year by the Ankara Art Fans Association and won the achievement award at the Turkish Radio and Television Art Awards Contest in 1970. He also won the Sedat Simavi Foundation Award in 1980 with his book Bir Cigara İçimi (Smoking a Cigarette), the Madarali Novel Award in 1981 with Danaburnu (Calf Nose) and the Necatigil Poetry Award in 1984 with Dilsiz ve Çıplak (Mute and Naked). All his works were published by Adam Publications with the title Bütün Şiirleri (All Poems).