Poems by ​Adil İZCİ

Ephemera
 
Good to have a glass lying around,
drained, to gather away the wools of panic:
Foothills, fresh clovers, and what not
Were, and perhaps are, as some fathomless dream.
 
Good are those dreams twice had
take death for granted, for time shall,
to us on equidistant tracks,
not so much as grant a single call.
 
Take death for granted yet a catalogue 
of the songs I cherish is still wanting:
It would, I say, drizzle a little—but let’s go easy on it
for songs should wont to naught as we have.
 
​
 
Voices
 
Who knows whose? A tamarisk dream says:
« I took wing as the day broke » and shall
land, so it contends, if it bumps into a dwam.  
 
Our tributes to the vociferations, for once,
of a touch-me-not, as lower branches snug 
into its canopy in usual springtide fears of plunder.
 
We thought it a day on planet Earth,
the wind blew for the elderly fowl,
we spotted poppies drifting in the air.
 
Of love a great deal was to hush.



 Translation: EKİN DEDEOĞLU

Adil İZCİ was born on February 16, 1954 in Niğde. He studied in Niğde until beginning his undergraduate degree studies in Ankara University Faculty of Languages, History & Geography, Drama Department, later to complete his studies in the New Turkish Literature Department in 1978. He worked as a Turkish Language & Literature Teacher at Robert College between the years of 1980 - 2010. He worked on cleaning the Turkish language through “Çağrı” magazine between 1983 – 1997, which was an arts and literature magazine he founded. He currently lives and works in İstanbul. He’s a member of the Language Association.

His first poem was published in “Hürriyet Gösteri” newspaper with encouragement from Doğan Hızlan in 1984. His poetry and other work has been published in the following publications to date: Adalı, Adam Sanat, Akatalpa, B(aşk)a, E, Cumhuriyet Kitap, Çağdaş Türk Dili, Çıkın, Dize, Göçebe, Güzel Yazılar, Hürriyet Gösteri, İnsan, Kıyı, Kidonya, Kiraz, Kitap-lık, Kum, Kurşun Kalem, Lacivert, Mavi Liman, Mühür, Nar, Poetik’us, Sincan İstasyonu, Şiir-lik, Şiir Oku, Şiir Ülkesi, Türkiye’de Sanat, Uç, Varlık, Yasakmeyve, Yaşasın Edebiyat, Yazılıkaya, Yine Hişt, other magazines and Cumhuriyet newspaper.

WORKS: POETRY: Günizi (Hera Şiir Kitaplığı, 1997), Su ve Yaprak (Hera Şiir Kitaplığı, 1999), Kır ve Gök (Yasakmeyve Yayınları, 2007), “Aşk İmiş” (YKY, 2009), Haiku’ş (Yasakmeyve Yayınları, 2013), ESSAYS - STORIES: Ağaçlar Kitabı (Toroslu Kitaplığı, 2004), Evler Sokaklar Kitabı (Yitik Ülke Yayınları, 2010), Kuşlar Kitabı (Sıcak Nal Yayınları, 2013), MEMOIR – CITY MONOGRAPHY: Eski Bir Niğde (Heyamola Yayınları, 2009), ÖYKÜ: Ada Sularında (Ve Yayınları, 2016) ANI: Örtmenim! (Sıcak Nal Yayınları, 2016) CHILDREN’S POETRY: Deniz Olsun Adı (Günışığı Kitaplığı, 2011), Bahar İkindisi (Kırmızı Kedi Yayınları, 2015), CHILDREN’S NOVEL: Karamel (Kültür Yayınları, 2014), Karamel’in Günlüğü (Uçan At Yayınları, 2017), Karamel’in Rüyaları (Uçan At Yayınları, 2017), Hayal Kurmaca (Kırmızı Kedi Yayınları, 2016), Hayvan Dostlarım (Kırmızı Kedi Yayınları, 2019), DERLEME: Mavi Kitap (Kültür Yayınları, 2019)

---

---