FOUR POEMS by YANITSA RADEVA
Art by Pinyu Hwang
Translators Note
Among all four poems the greatest challenges for me as a translator are hidden in the first one called This Is Also Istanbul. The fact that I know Yanitsa Radeva in person, most of her texts, and having spent a couple of decades in the city that has inspired her to write this piece of poetry, provides my English “interpretation” with a solid context. The poem is written by someone who has visited Istanbul only once and most probably some of its readers never did. Thus, my translation is aimed at preserving the author’s excitement and reflecting it adequately upon readers who should be able to imagine themselves as part of Istanbul’s daily texture. The password giving access to this fantasy is the most popular Turkish formula for “thank you” - “Teşekkür ederim”: a unique cultural reference used by Yanitsa in its original form, which introduces in the source text a second alphabet besides the Cyrillic one. I, in my capacities as a translator, was challenged to decide whether or not I should insert the English equivalent “Thank you” next to the first use of “Teşekkür ederim” in the third verse, and since the translation was meant to leave the Balkan cultural milieu, where this Turkish expression is more familiar, I did not hesitate in doing so.
Aziz Nazmi Shakir
Четири стихотворения
By Yanitsa Radeva
И това е Истанбул
Истанбул може да е бежова хартия с черни букви.
Върху хартията да пише
“teşekkür ederim”.
Може да е месо, което се пече.
Може да е мъжът, който го пече.
Кипяща вода за чай.
Жена, която бавно ти носи вилица.
Седиш и чакаш вкус и аромат,
чужденец си и сричаш пак и пак
“Teşekkür ederim”.
Ако искаш да опишеш всичко,
нищо няма да излезе,
ще допълзи спомен,
ще подухне ветрец и нищо повече.
Както когато искаш милост,
а милостта се изплъзва,
стоиш смутен и не намираш думата за милост.
А тя е на хартиена покривка.
Някъде в Истанбул, винаги ще е там,
дори когато увехне и я сменят с нова,
ще я помниш и няма да можеш да я опишеш.
Винаги едно “Teşekkür ederim”
някъде чака. Това кажи, ще е достатъчно.
Неделя
Този неделен ден няма да се повтори.
Слушам думите на бащата,
„дърво“ и „листо“ и после пак, „листо“ и „дърво“,
детето също ги слуша, но още повече чувството в тях,
затова се притиска към тялото на баща си,
и двамата става едно,
скулптурна фигура на баща, понесъл сина си през света,
и никой няма да го спре да стигне накъдето е тръгнал,
и никой не може да каже на детето, че тази неделя ще свърши.
То знае, този неделен ден няма да се повтори,
защото е вечен.
Така е устроен човекът
Когато дълго не стрижа косата си, заприличвам на град,
обрасъл с история, всеки косъм се разполовява и
от него тръгва алтернативен спомен,
както всяка улица се кръстосва с друга,
защото така е устроен човекът.
Когато дълго не стрижа косата си, тя прилича на знаме,
прокъсано от вятър, слънце, битки и поражения.
Защото така е устроен човекът.
Всяка загуба му личи, повече от всяка победа.
Зоопарк
Ревът на елена изтръгва природа,
в онзи вид,
който не познаваме
и аз, и той.
Родени в града, подивяваме
само в моменти на страх и любов.
Four Poems
Translated from Bulgarian by Aziz Nazmi Shakir
This Is Also Istanbul
Istanbul could be a beige sheet with black letters.
The paper could say:
“Teşekkür ederim.”: “Thank you”.
It could be meat that’s being roasted.
It could be the man who roasts it.
Water boiling for a cup of tea.
A woman slowly bringing you a fork.
You sit and wait for taste and aroma,
You’re a foreigner and you spell it out over and over:
“Teşekkür ederim”.
If you wish to describe all things,
Nothing will come out,
A memory will creep up,
A breeze will blow, and nothing more.
Like when you ask for mercy
And mercy slips away
You sit embarrassed and can’t find the word for mercy.
And it is on a paper tablecloth.
Somewhere in Istanbul, it will constantly be there,
Еven after it withers and is replaced by a new one,
You will remember it and you will not be able to describe it.
A “Teşekkür ederim” always
Waits somewhere. Say it, it will be enough.
Sunday
This Sunday won’t happen again.
I listen to the words of the father,
“Tree” and “leaf,” and then again “leaf" and “tree,”
The child also listens, or rather to the feeling,
that’s why he holds on tightly to his father’s body.
And the two becoming one,
A sculptural figure of a father carrying his son through the world,
and no one will stop him from getting where he’s going,
and no one can tell the child that this Sunday will end.
He knows, this Sunday won’t be repeated—
Because it is eternal.
That’s How Humans Are Made
When I don’t cut my hair for a long time, I start looking like a city.
Overgrown with history, every hair splits in half and
An alternative memory starts from it,
The way each street crosses another,
Because that’s how humans are made.
When I don’t cut my hair for a long time, it starts looking like a flag,
Torn by winds, sunrays, battles, and defeats.
Because that’s how humans are made.
Losses are more visible on them than victories.
Zoo
The roar of the deer tears (out) nature,
in that way
which we do not know
both me and him.
Born in the city, we go wild
only in moments of fear and love.
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Yanitsa Radeva (1977) made her debut with the poetry book Other Rhythms (2003). In 2011 she published her first novel, The Bonbonnière, based on a true story, which was noted with a young author’s diploma from the Ministry of Culture. Her second poetry book, A Hive of Words (2012), was nominated for the Nikolay Kanchev national poetry award. In the following years she published the novels The Season of Yoana (2015), The Road to Thebes (2017), and Hades Sends His Regards (2020). Yanitsa Radeva’s writings have been published prolifically in the foreign literary press, including the Croatian magazine Poezija (2009), the New York based Absinthe magazine (2012), the Iranian collection Post Soviet (2020). Her works have been translated into English, Korean, Macedonian, Romanian, Croatian, and Farsi.
Goffette published his first book of poems in 1969 when he was twenty-two; he has received the Prix Mallarmé (1989), the Grand prix de poésie de la Société des gens de lettres (1999), the Grand prix de poésie de l’Académie française (2001) and the Prix Goncourt for lifetime achievement (2010). His most recent volume of poems, Paris à ma porte appeared in March 2023. Pain perdu, the collection in which these two poems are included, was published in 2020.
Guy Goffette died on March 28, 2024, at the age of 76.
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Aziz Nazmi Shakir (1973) works in Arabic, Turkish, and English both as a translator and a writer. He has authored fivebooks of poetry, most recently Emergency Lane of the Soul (2023) and Round-the-World Tour of Absence (2016). An accomplished translator and editor with more than twenty translations of poetry and prose to his credit, he publishes both in Bulgaria and in Turkey. Aziz is a member of the Bulgarian Translators’ Union. He has participated in the International Writing Program in Iowa (2007 Fall residency) courtesy of the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State.