Orhan Veli Kanik Poems

These fine days have been my ruin.
On this kind of day I resigned
My job in 'Pious Foundations'
On this kind of day I started to smoke
...

I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed:
First, a light wind blowing
A soft wind swaying
The leaves in the trees,
...

Everything happened all of a sudden.
All of a sudden daylight beat down on the earth;
There was the sky all of a sudden;
...

Ones who don't live alone don't know
How much silence scares one;
How one talks to himself;
How one runs to mirrors,
...

I didn't believe I would have thoughts like this,
I would be sleepless at nights,
I would be so silent.
...

I am not far from you
Your eyes shall know to look, I am in your looks
Perhaps closer to you than yourself
...

This good weather ruined me,
I resigned in such a weather
From my government job.
I got used to tobacco in such a weather,
...

This is the city to walk around in the rain
Staring at the barges in the harbor
And to hum songs through the night.
...

If I cry, can you hear my voice,
In my lines;
Can you touch,
My tears, with your hands?
...

Hanging around on the Bridge,
Gleefully I watch all of you...
Out there, some of you row backward
Or pick mussels off the buoys;
...