Nazim Hikmet

1 I carved your name on my watchband With my fingernail. Where I am, you know, I don’t have a pearl-handled jackknife (they won’t give me anything sharp) or a plane tree with its

to the memory of my friend SI-YA-U, whose head was cut off in Shanghai A CLAIM Renowned Leonardo’s World-famous “La Gioconda” Has disappeared. And in the space Vacated by the fugitive A copy has

Sometimes, I, too, tell the ah’s Of my heart one by one Like the blood-red beads Of a ruby rosary strung on strands of golden hair! But my Poetry’s muse Takes to the air

I have no silver-saddled horse to ride, No inheritance to live on, Neither riches no real-estate A pot of honey is all I own. A pot of honey red as fire! My honey is

If half my heart is here, doctor, the other half is in China With the army flowing toward the Yellow River. And, every morning, doctor, Every morning at sunrise my heart is shot in

I was born in 1902 I never once went back to my birthplace I don’t like to turn back At three I served as a pasha’s grandson in Aleppo At nineteen as a student

You waste the attention of your eyes, The glittering labour of your hands, And knead the dough enough for dozens of loaves Of which you’ll taste not a morsel; You are free to slave

Taut, thick fingers punch The teeth of my typewriter. Three words are down on paper in capitals: SPRING SPRING SPRING… And me poet, proofreader, The man who’s forced to read Two thousand bad lines

11-11-1933 Bursa Prison My one and only! Your last letter says: “My head is throbbing, my heart is stunned!” You say: “If they hang you, if I lose you, I’ll die!” You’ll live, my

Look at the lion in the iron cage, Look deep into his eyes: like two naked steel daggers they sparkle with anger. But he never loses his dignity although his anger comes and goes

You’re like a scorpion, my brother, You live in cowardly darkness like a scorpion. You’re like a sparrow, my brother, Always in a sparrow’s flutter. You’re like a clam, my brother, Closed like a