Poets From Turkey

"Aşîk oldum şoy ay yüze nizar oldum bal ağîza Nazar kîldîm kara göze siyah olun kaşa geldim."

"I came to this world (as a ) stranger, I am tried of this land. The time has come that I break this trap of enslavement."

"Yunus'dur benim adım Gün geçtikçe artar odum İki cihanda maksûdum Bana seni gerek seni."

"Thy love hath taken me from me; Thou, Thou art needed by me. Day and night do I burn; Thou, Thou art needed by me. Were they to slay me, let them winnow my ashes into the heavens. There let my dust cry, "Thou, Thou art needed by me.""

"İki kişi söyleşür Yunus i görsem diyü Biri aydur ben gördüm bir aşik kocaimiş."

"translation:"

"Işkun aldî benden beni bana seni gerek seni Ben yanaram düni güni bana seni gerek seni. Eğer beni öldüreler külüm göke savuralar Toprağîm anda çağîra bana seni gerek seni."

"Two Persons talk, saying "Would that I see Yunus One [of them] says, "I saw, he is [only] an eminent lover."

"My name is Yunus, Each passing day fans and rouses my flame, What I desire in both worlds is the same: You're the one I need, you're the one I crave"

"I fell in love with this moon-face: Lavishly I am scattered on the honeymouth I glanced at the black eye; being black I landed on the eyebrow."

"Ben be mülke garib geldün ben bu ilden bizerem Bu dutsaklîk Tuzağîn demi geldi üzerem."

"Aşîklarîn gönlü gözü maşuk dapa gitmiş olur Ben gönlümü kul eyleyem başed ki maşuka irem."

"Lover's heart and eye will have gone toward the beloved. Let me render my heart a slave, it may happen that I join the beloved."

"In a democratic country at our stage of development, the social feasibility of stabilisation measures is at least as important as their economic feasibility. In such a country a static stability does not work or, even when it seems to work, it backfires at one stage. It has to be a dynamic stability, ensuring a certain momentum in growth and development."

"The unity of the Turkish nation is based on the fact that ethnic differentiation is alien to the traditional attitudes and social relations of the people of Turkey. Throughout history, ethnic or religious conflicts emerged in Turkey only when there were provocations from outside."

"The Bosphorus bridges do not only straddle the two sides of Istanbul but they also unite the continents of Europe and Asia. And this, not only in geographic terms, but in the political and cultural senses of the word as well."

"Turkey, is the leader country in democracy and secularism among the countries having a majority of Muslim population."

"Turkey has been one of the most rapidly changing societies of this age. Problems and conflicts arising out of change and transition have therefore been rather acute in Turkey. Change in Turkey did not start at the infrastructural level alone. Infrastructural and superstructural change have been taking place simultaneously. In some cases superstructural change has even preceded infrastructural change. The shocks and tremors of such a process of comprehensive and accelerated change were to some extent alleviated by the democratic regime which gave vent to the frustration caused by difficulties of adaptation, while at the same time increasing the difficulties of preserving democracy."

"The Turks have been Europeans for 600 years. But the Turks are not only Europeans. They are also Asian, Caucasian and Middle Eastern at once."

"However, the refusal of the European Union to grant membership to Turkey has played an educative role. It's made us realize that the world does not consist of Western Europe alone, that a country can become strong politically and economically by concentrating, by diversifying its international relations, all the world over, and we have been doing that with increasing success."

"Turkey is, I believe, a model for Islamic countries for the sake of her democracy and modernization. Of course, some circles try to subvert this regime, but it has been solidly entrenched, and I think that its influence is becoming wider in the world."

"There are, today, a greater number of Islamic countries progressing towards democracy or practicing a degree of, some degrees of democracy than a decade or two earlier. I believe that Turkey's example has played an important role in this respect, because the Turkish experiment has proven that Islam can be compatible with modernity, with secularism, and with democracy."

"After the bipolar world ended and the Soviet Union dissipated, many political circles, or political observers, students in North European countries, thought that Turkey's security value for the Western countries had been considerably diminished. But as a world power, the United States saw the facts earlier than most European countries, and realized that, on the contrary, after the ending of the bipolar world, the geopolitical importance of Turkey would have been augmented very much because, with the ending of the Soviet Union, the merger of Europe and Asia had gained pace and Turkey played a key role, a pivotal role in this merger of the two big continents."

"Yet, whatever the negative effects of such external factors may be, surmounting our deficiencies is primarily our own task and responsibility."

"Happy Greece has returned to democracy. Only wish is that the new government should realise the value of close cooperation between Turkey and Greece."

"It is no easy matter to make democracy live and to live by democracy for a country grappling with the tremendous difficulties and handicaps of being at the stage of development. The temptation may often be aroused, in the face of such difficulties, to look for deceptive short cuts that unwittingly may cause the society to drift away from the course of democracy – a course that requires patience, perseverance and tolerance."

"Some members of the European Union may think that it will take many years for Turkey to become a full-member. But, I am convinced that given the dynamism of the Turkish people and their attachment to democracy, we will achieve this objective in a far shorter period."

"If you cut even a branch out of my forests, I'd cut your head off!"

"To turn away from the enemy is cowardice. Misfortune is the fate of the enemy."

"One night, I shall add your kingdom to my empire."

"If you are the sultan, be at the head of our army in this difficult day for our state. However, if I am the sultan, I order you to come and command my armies immediately!"

"We conquer hearts, not lands."

"Even I accepted that the rituals and rituals of the people of Galata should continue in the same manner as they have always been."

"If even a single strand of hair in my beard were to learn a secret of mine, I would cut it from the root."

"The Christian land has lost its sword and shields."

"In order to see the boundaries of the probabilities, we need to try impossible."

"O, Constantinople! It's either I who'll take you, or you!"

"I declare to the whole world, the Bosnians are under protection. No one can disturb these people nor their churches, nor harm them. Nobody in the world will touch these people and not harm them."

"Tell to your emperor that where my power has reached, not even his dreams can!"

"True art is to create a magnificent city and fill the hearts of its people with happiness."

"We are not afraid of the owl, we are sometimes hawks."

"We, the Turks, are faithful Muslims."

"These troubles are paved in the way of Allah. As we have the sword of Islam in our hands, if we were to not endure such hardship, it would not be worthy to call ourselves ghazis."

"Would all of Europe soon go the way of northern India? By 1529, with the Turks besieging Vienna, this must have appeared a distinct possibility to some. In actual fact, the line then stabilized in northern Hungary and the Holy Roman Empire was preserved; but thereafter the Turks presented a constant danger and exerted a military pressure which could never be fully ignored. Even as late as 1683, they were again besieging Vienna. Almost as alarming, in many ways, was the expansion of Ottoman naval power. Like Kublai Khan in China, the Turks had developed a navy only in order to reduce a seagirt enemy fortress—in this case, Constantinople, which Sultan Mehmet blockaded with large galleys and hundreds of smaller craft to assist the assault of 1453. Thereafter, formidable galley fleets were used in operations across the Black Sea, in the southward push toward Syria and Egypt, and in a whole series of clashes with Venice for control of the Aegean islands, Rhodes, Crete, and Cyprus. For some decades of the early sixteenth century Ottoman sea power was kept at arm’s length by Venetian, Genoese, and Habsburg fleets; but by midcentury, Muslim naval forces were active all the way along the North African coast, were raiding ports in Italy, Spain, and the Balearics, and finally managed to take Cyprus in 1570–1571, before being checked at the battle of Lepanto."

"The Ottoman Empire was, of course, much more than a military machine. A conquering elite (like the Manchus in China), the Ottomans had established a unity of official faith, culture, and language over an area greater than the Roman Empire, and over vast numbers of subject peoples. For centuries before 1500 the world of Islam had been culturally and technologically ahead of Europe. Its cities were large, well-lit, and drained, and some of them possessed universities and libraries and stunningly beautiful mosques. In mathematics, cartography, medicine, and many other aspects of science and industry—in mills, gun-casting, lighthouses, horsebreeding—the Muslims had enjoyed a lead. The Ottoman system of recruiting future janissaries from Christian youth in the Balkans had produced a dedicated, uniform corps of troops. Tolerance of other races had brought many a talented Greek, Jew, and Gentile into the sultan’s service—a Hungarian was Mehmet’s chief gun-caster in the Siege of Constantinople. Under a successful leader like Suleiman I, a strong bureaucracy supervised fourteen million subjects—this at a time when Spain had five million and England a mere two and a half million inhabitants. Constantinople in its heyday was bigger than any European city, possessing over 500,000 inhabitants in 1600."

"I am astonished that the Italians treat me with hostility and incite the Greeks against me, even though we are of the same origin as the Italians and, like them, I have the right to avenge the blood of Hector on the Greeks."

"Just as there is one sun in the sky, ideally there should be only one state and religion in the world."

"Let the Genoese merchants travel and trade freely. We will not take their children to join the Janissary corps nor will we ever use force against those who do not accept our religion."

"Cover the Christian mosaics with plaster so that the believers will not be disturbed. But do not destroy this masterpiece."

"One who doesn’t know law thinks one lives in a jungle. One who knows law knows one lives in a jungle."