English · TÜRKÇE

ON LIVING by Nazım Hikmet Ran
TRANSLATION by Selim Ünlüsoy

I
Living is no laughing matter,
You must face it with all gravity,
Like a squirrel, for instance–
I mean without seeking something beyond or above living,
I mean living must be your sole mission.

You must take living so seriously,
To such an extent and degree,
That with hands tied behind your back,
Back against the wall,
Or even in a lab,
In your white coat and thick spectacles keen,
You must be prepared to die for people–
Even for those whose faces you’ve never seen,
Even when nobody has forced you to do so,
Even knowing living
is the truest, most beautiful thing.

I mean you must approach living with such earnestness,
That even at seventy, for example, you’ll plant olive trees-
and not for your children, mind you,
but because although you fear death, you don’t believe in it,
Because living, I mean, carries greater weight.

1947

II
Let’s say we’re gravely ill, in need of a cure–
from the sterile table, we may not return pure.
Though it’s hard not to feel blue
about departing a little ahead of the queue,
we’ll still laugh at the Bektaşi joke being told,
or glance through the window, question the rain,
still, in eagerness, for the fresh news we'll strain.

Let’s say we’re on the front line–
for a cause worth fighting for.
There, in the first strike, on that very day,
we might collapse, lifeless, in dismay.
We’ll grasp this with an odd resentment,
but we’ll still worry ourselves to exhaustion
about the war’s fate, spanning perhaps for years.

Let’s say we’re imprisoned,
nearing fifty in our condition,
and eighteen more years to the iron gate’s submission.
We’ll still continue to live with the outside,
with its people and creatures, struggle and tide–
I mean, with the outside beyond the walls.

So, wherever and however we may be,
Life must be lived as if death is but a myth…

1948

III
This Earth will grow cold,
a star among stars, one of the smallest to behold,
a gilded speck on blue velvet–
I mean this, our majestic Earth.
This Earth will grow cold someday,
not even as a lifeless cloud,
nor a heap of ice,
but like an empty walnut, drifting in darkness unavowed…
The pain of this must be felt from now,
This sorrow to be felt even now.
So deeply you’ll love this earthly sphere,
only then you can truly say, “I have lived.”

1948

YAŞAMAYA

DAİR

ON

LIVING

ON LIVING

DAİR

YAŞAMAYA

ON LIVING

ON
LIVING