Mistaken Living - Yanlış Yaşamak (Translation)

i'm a mistaken door, all black
i shut on my own self
i lost you in paris
i'm searching for you in a wrong place
each clock that i break
makes me all the more uneasy on the inside
i have no happiness left
i've spent whatever you left
inge bruckhart
i can't look at your pictures

a wrong cloud is multiplying
towards my mistaken inside at evenings
in my mouth, the taste of a dead battery
this is not that fear that i live anymore
getting tangled in phone rings
look, i am neither in leipzig
nor are you in istanbul
we are neither drinking tea in cafe depart
nor wine in tiryaki kopek
i will die without seeing you
without seeing again
inge bruckhart
i haven't been alive for many years anyway

were we always mistaken, i wonder
i don't feel like believing it
is that wrong train the one we've taken?
the one in which we dwindled and got forgotten
you know, the one ending in leipzig station
are we living mistaken again
coughing our darkness into our palms
you, put into the desolation of a woman
blue-eyed, more than half
smiling from september to september
me, knotted to invisible rails
a man echoing in stations
pawned for less than his worth

should we go die or what
accepting the biggest mistake
isn't it that a secret moisture pervaded your hands
that or your hair is autumn all the way
the princess of mistakes, inge bruckhart
it is snowing again on marne
linden trees, all white at night
whenever mistaken, realizing being pointless
one gets ashamed of being alive
fears of solitude in our dreams
our outside, most insolent mistakes
our inside is totally another type of shame

(original poem: Attila İlhan, translation: Köksal Karakuş)

------------------

Here is the original poem in Turkish:

yanılmış bir kapıyım simsiyah
kendi üstüme kapanıyorum
seni paris'te kaybettim
yanlış bir yerde arıyorum
bozduğum her saat
içimi büsbütün daraltıyor
hiçbir mutluluğum kalmadı
ne bıraktıysan harcadım
inge bruckhart
resimlerine bakamıyorum

yanlış bir bulut çoğalıyor
akşamları yanılmış içlerime
ağzımda bozuk bir pil tadı
o korku değil artık bu yaşadığım
telefon zillerine dolaşarak
bak ne ben leipzig'deyim
ne de sen istanbul'da
ne depart kahvesi'nde çay içiyoruz
ne tiryaki köpek'te şarap
seni görmeden öleceğim
bir daha görmeden
inge bruckhart
zaten kaç yıldır yaşamıyorum

hep yanıldık mı kimbilir
inanmak geliyor içimden
o yanlış tren bindiğimiz midir?
azala azala unutulduğumuz
hani leipzig garı'nda biten
yine yanlış mı yaşıyoruz
karanlığımızı avuçlarımıza öksürerek
sen bir kadın ıssızlığına koşulmul
yarıdan fazla mavi gözlü
eylülden eylüle gülümseyen
ben görünmez raylara düğümlü
garlarda yankılanan bir erkek
değerinden eksiğine bozulmuş

ölüversek mi ne
en büyük yanlışlığı benimseyerek
gizli bir nem sinmemiş mi ellerine
ya saçların fena halde sonbahar
yanlışlar prensesi inge bruckhart
yine merne üzerine kar yağıyor
geceleyin bembeyaz ıhlamur ağaçları
yanıldıkça lüzumsuzluğunu anlayıp
insan yaşadığından utanıyor
uykularımızda yanlızlık korkuları
dışımız en küstah yanlışlıklar
içimiz en başka türlü ayıp

(More Literally) 50 Shades of Gray

Being Apart is Part of Love - Ayrılık Sevdaya Dahil (Translation)

rambling roses, blossomed
languid with their smell
at the most splendid hour of the starry twilight
coiled like a hidden serpent
crying on a distant phone
the rainy young woman

the wind
has exiled stars to distant darknesses
purple sparks are passing
by my scattered solitude
i long for her so much, i long for her so much
at every part of my body
is her pain, heavily burnt
i strike lightning at some places
the moment i feel our being apart
irons melt out of my rage"

sunk in moonlight
black pepper trees
silver dust
lilies are swimming on night's river
jasmines, forgotten,
smile uneasily
because breaking up too has a wild taste
because being apart too is part of love
because those apart are still beloved
can't live any moment alone
together with the other at each moment
everything is about the other

soft bats in flurried darkness
and gradually widening
smell of burnt grass
stars are unbelievably large
reflections holding all the coastline
because breaking up too has a wild taste
so wild a taste, unbearable
because being apart too is part of love
because those apart are still beloved

solitude
fast descending clouds
a dark weight
the air is heavy, the earth is heavy, the leaf is heavy
water dust is raining on us
wonder if our freedom is our solitude
hazy dark blue, almost lilac
a fog has surrounded the forest
darkness has fallen upon the sea
solitude
as hard as a flintstone
as sharp as diamonds
whichever side you roll over to you get cut
you lose much blood
especially if there is noone who knocks at your door
noone who holds your hand
wrists like the pure white neck of a swan
fingers long and thin
warm glances like an accomplice
fleeting smiles, hidden
the biggest problem of the lonely ones
what's the use of freedom by oneself
that's what they can't ever solve
so that it doesn't look like
the cold desertedness
of a dead planet
freedom shall surely be shared
with a beloved accomplice

we had thought
we were here on the world
only for each other
we both had thought
we would fit easily in
even a one-person solitude 
we weren't wrong the slightest bit
even if we fall and break
and scatter saltlike, like a crystal glass
each moment, again and again
still inside us, that volcano vent
still smiling red hot
-like a fiery smile-
our love, poisonous and serpentine

(original poem: Attila İlhan, translation: Köksal Karakuş)

*****************

Here is the original poem in Turkish:

açılmış sarmaşık gülleri
kokularıyla baygın
en görkemli saatinde yıldız alacasının
gizli bir yılan gibi yuvalanmış
içimde keder
uzak bir telefonda ağlayan
yağmurlu genç kadın

rüzgâr
uzak karanlıklara sürmüş yıldızları
mor kıvılcımlar geçiyor
dağınık yalnızlığımdan
onu çok arıyorum onu çok arıyorum
heryerinde vücudumun
ağır yanık sızıları
bir yerlere yıldırım düşüyorum
ayrılığımızı hissettiğim an
demirler eriyor hırsımdan

ay ışığına batmış
karabiber ağaçları
gümüş tozu
gecenin ırmağında yüzüyor zambaklar
yaseminler unutulmuş
tedirgin gülümser
çünkü ayrılmanın da vahşi bir tadı var
çünkü ayrılık da sevdâya dahil
çünkü ayrılanlar hâlâ sevgili
hiç bir anı tek başına yaşayamazlar
her an ötekisiyle birlikte
herşey onunla ilgili

telâşlı karanlıkta yumuşak yarasalar
gittikçe genişleyen
yakılmış ot kokusu
yıldızlar inanılmayacak bir irilikte
yansımalar tutmuş bütün sâhili
çünkü ayrılmanın da vahşi bir tadı var
öyle vahşi bir tad ki dayanılır gibi değil
çünkü ayrılık da sevdâya dahil
çünkü ayrılanlar hâlâ sevgili

yalnızlık
hızla alçalan bulutlar
karanlık bir ağırlık
hava ağır toprak ağır yaprak ağır
su tozları yağıyor üstümüze
özgürlüğümüz yoksa yalnızlığımız mıdır
eflatuna çalar puslu lacivert
bir sis kuşattı ormanı
karanlık çöktü denize
yalnızlık
çakmak taşı gibi sert
elmas gibi keskin
ne yanına dönsen bir yerin kesilir
fenâ kan kaybedersin
kapını bir çalan olmadı mı hele
elini bir tutan
bilekleri bembeyaz kuğu boynu
parmakları uzun ve ince
sımsıcak bakışları suç ortağı
kaçamak gülüşleri gizlice
yalnızların en büyük sorunu
tek başına özgürlük ne işe yarayacak
bir türlü çözemedikleri bu
ölü bir gezegenin
soğuk tenhalığına
benzemesin diye
özgürlük mutlaka paylaşılacak
suç ortağı bir sevgiliyle

sanmıştık ki ikimiz
yeryüzünde ancak
birbirimiz için varız
ikimiz sanmıştık ki
tek kişilik bir yalnızlığa bile
rahatça sığarız
hiç yanılmamışız
her an düşüp düşüp
kristal bir bardak gibi
tuz parça kırılsak da
hâlâ içimizde o yanardağ ağzı
hâlâ kıpkızıl gülümseyen
-sanki ateşten bir tebessüm-
zehir zemberek aşkımız

(source: http://www.attilailhan.com/attilla-ilhan%E2%80%99in-ayrilik-sevdaya-dahil-siiri.html/)

alpha scorpii

she has the posture of a scorpion
ever ready to strike down if you
show the slightest sign of weakness

yet you felt for her forearms
always scarred, fighting off monsters
in dreams with no apparent end in sight
in dreams you could never be a part of
you fell for those scars, which somehow
you felt on your heart, and a pure white
terra incognita - with a sting on rear end

a ship, with sails of the purest white
which created a chain reaction, which
ended up with a craving for salt and water
and a wish for smothering pressures, for hadal depths
-take away this false hope off of me, ah, it burns-
waves beating like thunder in the most silent night
a pointy topmast you see from time to time

yet rolls the night sky, leaving its place
to a new day, ah, i must believe in second chances
let's try it again, this time with feeling
may the numbness, the relic of the sting go away
dear sun, my favorite g-type star, my favorite burning orb
burn me with all your might, burn me to my core
leave nothing but what always is, what is true
venom be gone, monsters be gone, shadows be gone

she still trots around like a scorpion
a constellation on some stranger night sky
a forgotten memory, a distant pain
or a childhood lullaby

Pinar Selek - A case of persecution in Turkey

It is hardly a secret that Turkey is a country where freedom of speech only applies if you are strong or if you side with the strong. Although one of the current administration's (AKP, whose A incidentally stands for "justice") main selling points has been the freedom of speech (Tayyip Erdoğan was sent to jail in 1999 for a poem he recited in one of his speeches) since 2002, there has hardly been an improvement on the issue; only the color of the issue has changed: now you do not get sent to jail for reciting religious-militaristic poetry, but no guarantees for anything else. Just keep it to yourself, and you will be fine. Unless some trigger-happy prosecutor somewhere singles you out that is. You will be linked to some organization or some crime at their whim. Evidence? Evidence schmevidence, mere details...

There are a high number of journalists in prison in Turkey: http://www.cpj.org/europe/turkey/ . And then some... There is one sad case that came to the headlines recently, the case of Pinar Selek, a sociologist and writer. The more you read into her case, the more you feel nauseous from all the stench that comes from her prosecution; there are so many wrong things on so many different levels. There is an explosion somewhere in Istanbul, which experts say is from the accidental ignition of a gas cylinder. Pinar Selek gets arrested on unrelated charges around the time (for being a member of PKK, a terrorist group in Turkey). She gets tortured (proven by medical reports) and at some point, they decide to charge her with the said explosion. The witness against her recants his statement, another witness cannot have given the statement as she cannot speak Turkish language and she says she does not know Pinar Selek. But that does not stop Turkish justice system (or whoever singled out Pinar Selek) and she goes to trial. She gets acquitted three times on lack of evidence as well as because of the fact that the blast is not a terrorist attack. The prosecution puts her on a retrial for the 4th time, and with some gerrymandering with the judge panel (one of the original judges is on leave, and the new judges seem to hasten her trial not to leave it to the judge who actually knows the case) they give her a lifelong sentence. You can read more about her case here: http://www.pinarselek.com/public/page_item.aspx?id=1810

There are times you feel helpless against an injustice that is being done right in front of your eyes. Many times it is only the tip of the iceberg: who knows how many similar cases there are we do not hear about. It is sickening and saddening when you think about it.  I really want to believe this story will not end here and I want to believe that justice will be served to those who perpetrated unjustice in this case. Pinar Selek, we might be silent but we are not powerless, and we are with you.

An early locked position in a Scrabble game

In a Scrabble game, towards the end of the game the board can get locked, i.e. no player can play any more words no matter how many times they exchange their tiles. I tried to come up with a locked postion early in the game, and I came up with a solution with 9 tiles on the board. The following position's lockedness comes from these facts:

• No other word starts or ends with QIS 
• No other word starts with XU
• No other word starts with SOX (and only one other word ends with it: BOBBYSOX, and that doesn't help here)
• There are words that end with Q, but it is not possible to write them in this position since there is no 2 letter word that ends with Q

I'm referring to the TWL (Tournament Word List) here, since I play Scrabble mainly on Facebook. Also one Q and one X in the diagram are produced using the two blank tiles.

Please let me know if there is a solution with fewer tiles.

Here is the locked position:

haiku

 dog paw prints 

on the base of the dirty pool

winter's dusk in cyprus

(thanks to google translate, might be off)

Hayde (Kazım Koyuncu) - lyrics & translation

This is a beautiful song belonging to the late Kazım Koyuncu. Every departure is early, but his was especially so. The lyrics are in the Black Sea region's local dialect, hence might be foreign to a beginner of Turkish. The song is in that region's musical style, which is popular throughout Turkey. One especially enjoys the tulum solos in the song.



My translation -which is quite crude- follows:

Come on let's go, come on
To the mountain for blackberries*
To someone who is engaged to another
How can I say come on

I climbed and pruned the pine
Dropped it to half of what it was
How does one call this love
May the ground swallow it

One shouldn't prune
Alder sapling off the top
One shouldn't shy away from
The beloved lover this much

I climbed down to the flat of the brook
And grafted the engraftment
Being in love is a good thing
And I have just started doing it

* karayemiş: literally "blackberry", but refers to cherry laurel.

---and here are the original lyrics---

Hayde gidelum hayde
Dağa karayemişa
Elun nişanlisina
Ben nasil deyim hayde

Çiktum çami budadum
Endurdum yarisina
Boyle sevda mi olur
Girsun yerun dibina

Kizilağaç fidani
Tepeden budanur mi
İnsan sevduği yardan
Bu kadar utanur mi

Endum dere duzina
Aşlamayi aşladum
Sevdaluk eyi şeydur
Ben da yeni başladum

Power Struggle

When a struggle ends with the victory of one side, watch for a new struggle to emerge soon, among the constituents of the winning side, which were previously forged together with the perceived common threat. The common threat now gone, the alliances dissolve, new opposing ranks are formed. The losing side in the original conflict may join one side, or sit at the bench waiting for its turn to intervene in the correct time during the course of this new struggle. If there is no clear-cut lines among the victorious alliance, there may some emerge soon; for power has the tendency to divide in amoeba-like fashion and create its own antithesis.

A Serbian Movie: A Review

"A Serbian Movie" (Srpski Film) is a very disturbing noir/horror movie with a strong porn theme. A word of caution here, if you have the slighest doubt, just don't watch the movie. Also, there may or may not be spoilers in the following review.

The main character is Milos, a Serbian ex-porn star -one of the best in his line of business-, with a beautiful and loving wife, and a cute lively boy. Everything is perfect, except they have monetary problems. An opportunity comes in his way, a slightly weird porn director, Vukmir offers him main role in one of his artsy-porny films. Though he inquires, the details of the movie are unknown by Milos. He signs the contract regardless because the money is good, but he still has his doubts.

When they start to shoot the movie, we see that the casting location is an orphanage. We see a teenage girl, and then her mother, and some commotion between the mom and the girl and the cameramen (who happen to be dressed in a cop/military outfit) ensues. The first scene to be shot is between Milos and the mom, who had been just beaten by one of the cop/cameramen; and there is some talk about the women being the wife of a dead war-hero, and that she cheated on him. Things start to get weirder around here. During the (oral) sexual act, a movie of the teenage girl, innocently eating ice cream, is projected on the wall.

That night Milos has his doubts about the movie, which he shares with his wife. The next day he goes back to Vukmir, and mentions about his concerns to him. Vukmir tries to convince Milos to go on with the shooting, though unsuccessfully. At some point he shows Milos a weird porn (disturbing scene 1: the newborn porn). Milos runs out. From here on we realize Milos is drugged, with a concoction that makes him sexually very aroused and apparently obedient/zombie-like.

During the rest of the movie we see Milos, horny and mindless, is being herded by Vukmir, according to a master plan. Things go sour for everyone that is involved (except the mastermind of the mastermind), as we see through scenes of disgusting/taboo-breaking/bloodied sexual atrocities.

There's the repetitive theme of Milos coming face to face with the the mention/possibility of a sexual act with an innocent/minor (the new born porn, the tradition of virginal communion, and the most shocking last scene, which I won't mention here), and each time he manages to run away from this, except the last time, when he is tricked into it. Even while under the effect of the drugs, as soon as he realizes the situation he is in, he manages to awaken himself enough to turn the tables on the director and his thugs/cops/cameramen/whatever.

Milos' sexual potency is a metaphor of the power of a man; it makes the people near him happy, and it punishes those that are a threat to him and his kin. His wife asks him "if he does not want to fuck her", and then he shows her he can "fuck her" but he prefers to make love with her, to use his power on his family in a loving way.

Then there is the outside world. The man has to rent his power to the outside world to live. A man has to be like Milos, he has to know to whom he has to not use his power against with a clear and distinct line. And there are people (government?) who for their own benefit wants the man to use his power on those who are innocent.

The man on the street will have hard choices when trying to survive using his power for the benefit of himself and his loved ones, however the outside world will force him to use his power against innocents/his loved ones. He will try to win and gain freedom from this cycle of power, but many times he will lose, end up hurting innocents or losing his soul. And if you somehow try to fight this outside world, they might pull all your teeth and choke you by ramming their power down your throat.

A secondary metaphor in this movie, parallel to the one I just mentioned, is at the level of governments. Milos is Serbia , his wife is Croatia, his kid is Bosnia (as Vukmir proclaims in the movie, "A perfect Serbian Family"). They are a happy family: Yugoslavia (the cop brother who has his eyes on the beautiful wife could be Russia here, a world cop, I don't know). Serbia used his power to make his family happy in the past, but when they had economic problems, he wanted to use his power once more for the good of the family. However, induced in a mad/frenzied state, he is tricked into using his power on his wife and son (fucking as a weapon is no coincidence here of course, see: Mass rapes in the Bosnian War), and as soon as he realizes this, it is too late to go back to being a happy family they once were. He hugs them one last time in the bed, they are all cuddled into each other. And then bang, Yugoslavia is no more (see the map below; the mirror image of the cuddling scene in the movie). In the end we see powers-that-be, exerting their "power" onto the now broken family. The mafioso guy directs his goon to "start from the little one."

I repeat, the movie is very disturbing, and while I understand that it will be very hard to watch, even by the horror/gory savvy; you have to keep in mind that this is a totally different movie than a random pointless teen-slasher, or a hills have eyes type movie (family parallels), or a snuff film (social oppression metaphor?) . Someone who is innocent will be disturbed by the movie, because he or she will not want to know the horrors (government) which actually do exist in the real world. Someone who is used to the regular horror/gory genre will be disappointed and disturbed, because he will get the hint of deeper disturbances other than mere flesh and blood gore. Again, and i'm not saying this to create a reverse psychology and make you watch the movie: Though it is a good movie, just do not watch it if you have the slightest doubt.

point of no return

how late is too late
how deep do these murky waters go
and is there ever a right time to start to panic?

breathe...

dark streets, well past midnight. kalamazoo, hazel, climax... ugly night. sticky like any other sin. dark. turn around the corner. hide and seek. ghosts with sick faces. i really wish there was a mirror to wake me up. round and round.

and sometimes it's rainy. or snowy. still dark. round and round. till early morning. sad stories strolling through deserted streets. as if in a disturbing dream. noone to wake you up.

breathe...

after what point can you not turn back
and how much is too much?

all is dust

what are rocks?
broken earth, like solitary men
broken from the rest of humanity

what are pebbles?
fragments of rocks, rounded by
waves constantly washing ashore

what is sand?
ground up pebbles, in a very long time
ah yes, that is what time does

what is dust?
at some point what we all become
"one wrathful moment, and all is dust"

snap

with a snap of your fingers you could create the whole existence anew, yet you preferred to stand there, gazing into the void -bravely i might add-, looking straight into nothingness, and standing guard against the demons of the night, the oncoming darkness that will cover the slightest ray of hope blind, nothing will penetrate the dark tinted windows of that house whose doors are bolted securely and locked tight, yes you just stood there, at the edge of eternity, watching out for those times which inevitably would fly away, as if you wanted to freeze everything, you wanted nothing to pass, even time, you stood there, your eyes fixed on the erratic thread which we lowly life forms call the future, trying to fix it into one beautiful path, the path of your liking, yet things rarely go the way one planned, i can't tell if you managed what you set out for, i lost your sight at some point, thus the story ends, or does it

2 more Masyu puzzles

(Masyu rules)

2 Around-the-corner puzzles

This is a rather interesting and relatively straight-forward type of puzzle, quite well-known among puzzle enthusiasts, yet I can't seem to find the proper name for it (It's called "Köşe Kapmaca" in Turkish). So I named it "Around-the-corner". The grey squares here are supposed to be circles originally, but I wanted to separate it from the Masyu puzzles, hence the grey squares.

Rules for Around-the-corner:
1. Draw a line that forms a (non-intersecting) loop and goes through every square.
2. At a grey square, the line turns 90 degrees.
3. From a grey square to another, there is exactly one 90 degree turn.

2 more Masyu puzzles

(Masyu rules)

2 Heyawake puzzles

(Heyawake rules)

2 Masyu puzzles

(Masyu rules)

whistlash

I dreamt a dream but it was no dream at all
thought I saw something, or heard someone whistling
opened my eyes and all I saw was a blur
could be anyone, or maybe it was nothing
a moment she was there, and another it's gone
like a whisper, or someone turning into a whistle

Arithmetical Sudoku

(Operations read from left to right and top to bottom. The rows and columns with operations are marked.)