Poems by Mete Özel ​

ENTERING THE TEMPLE
 
the night is bitter the day is
blue
worship the dream
purify in the waters
of the reaper
let your mind rest
in the hollow of the altar
of the furious god
let the time flow
let your tune reign
let your breath be
the poetry
of the city
with domes of lead
let the night be bitter
the day be blue
worship the dream
purify in the waters
of the reaper
 
Mete Ozel
Translated by Cihat Salman 05/12/2008
Turkish version was published in Adam Sanat art magazine, no: 56, February 1990
 
 
Echo
 
there comes
a day

my beloved
narcissus

kills
his evils

his nudity
remains

half
on the pond

while the prophet’s
image

dissolves
with high

cries
in deep

valleys
hidden is

the passion
crystalizing

mirror
vacuums

my dream
 

 
into eternity

 
 
Mete Ozel
Translated by Kemal Atakay and Cihat Salman
Turkish version was published in Adam Sanat, No: 87, February 1993


 
 
Tulips
 
                                                               “O ton Adonin!
                                                                 o ton Adonin!”
 
when it rains the soil remembers herself
remembers who dropped his seeds where
the cocoon breaking in agony
shall incubate its twin
in exact shape it was before
and shall greet its new life
 
i my love
was soil
soil
and i bled to death
then was reborn with the rain and ran to you
with glowing Manisa tulips at my cuffs
 
​Translated by Cihat Salman
(This is a series of poems called "Shame", and this is the 15th)

 Mete Özel graduated from University of Istanbul, English Philology in 1985.
His advertorial short essays were published in Cumhuriyet’s (a daily newspaper) books supplement and Kitaplık (a literary magazine).
His Poem Echo was a subject of a seminar in 1994 presented by Kemal Atakay who is a well-known translator and critic.
His first poem was published in 1986 in Adam Sanat (a literary magazine). He has published his poems also in various periodicals such as Sombahar (Istanbul), Bir Yeni Biçem (Bursa), Gezgin (Germany), Mısralık (Cyprus), Dirty Goat (Austin, Texas), Sözcükler (Istanbul), Yasakmeyve (Istanbul) Varlık (Istanbul), Ç.N. [Translator’s Note] (Istanbul), etc.
Some of his poems were translated by Fiona Tomkinson, published in Dirty Goat, Austin, Texas (2006 - No: 14-  P, 156-157). Two lines from his poem called the Mountain Song were carved on a stone erected at Town Square, High Street, Slough, London in 2008 by Alec Peever, who is a famous English sculpturer working in cooperation with the English Poetry Society.
Mete Özel was General Coordinator of [Ç.N.] (Translator’s Note - a literary translation periodical, published in Turkey by Tozan Alkan). His translations from Armenian, Polish, Mongolian and Russian poets were published in this and other literary periodicals within 2009.
Mete Özel’s first book “Ilgım Düş Esrar” [Mirage Dream Mystery] was published by Yasakmeyve, (a literary magazine published by Enver Ercan who is the chairman of the Turkish Writers Union) in 2008, which is more than 20 years after his first poem had been published in Adam Sanat in May 1986.
Since 2013 he is working with Slobodan Dan Paich and a group of artists related with “halka art project” and “Artship Foundation” and participated in bilingual story telling performances as an Anatolian oral traditions proponent, cultural heritage researcher, translator, Poet, writer, and a storyteller.
In 2016, three of his poems, published in Varlık and Yasakmeyve exhibited in halka art project’s gallery in Moda and in The Bonnafont Gallery in San Francisco. The first poem Roads (Yollar) is published in Varlık July 2016, hail to Slobodan Dan Paich’s “the certainty of uncertain direction” and Neşe Şahin’s “that which passes thru blue” paintings. The second and third poems are published in Yasakmeyve, June - July 2016, Wo in the Birch Forest of Oblation (Adaklı Huş Ormanında Wo), an ecphrasis to Neşe Şain painting and Tailored Basilisk (Ismarlama Şahmeran), an ecphrasis to the painting of Belkıs Taşkeser.
He is currently one of the founding partners of an international translation company called Mirora; he is married with a son and lives in Istanbul.

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