Statement of Record

I knew it as such

I

I knew it as such

I

By İlhan Sami Çomak

From Hymns Written by Cats

The dark side of the mountains
was a color jealous of blue, I knew it as such.
Like a clumsy rock, I split the air into two
I whistled
I liken whistling to horses.
With a slice of bread whose surface gives meaning to heat
Among all kinds of smells
the breath of silence breaks the waves
at the first illusion devoted to water and stone
I knew it as much as rain and suns
Then I turned my head
with knots tied all wrong
I harmonized the images of moss.
At the back, a woman was braiding her hair
I saw the seas inside those braids
And constant waves
in the middle of her mouth.

xxx

xxx

Translated by Öykü Tekten

About the author

İlhan Sami Çomak is Turkey’s longest-serving student prisoner. He has published eight collections of poetry in Turkey over the past 27 years of his sentence. His latest book, Geldim Sana, won the prestigious Sennur Sezer prize. İlhan was arrested while studying geography in Istanbul in 1994 and sentenced to life in prison for the alleged crime of separatism. He maintains his innocence.
In 2020, PEN Norway began to campaign for his release and to invite poets from around the world to write for him.

About the author

Öykü Tekten is a poet, translator, and editor living between Granada and New York. She is also a founding member of Pinsapo, an art and publishing experience with a particular focus on work in and about translation, as well as a contributing editor and archivist with Lost & Found: The CUNY Poetics Document Initiative.

Statement of Record

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