Kurdi's diwan, 19th-century

1.

Is tonight the year’s longest or just pitch dark?
Far from you, my eyes are without light tonight.

My heart is a secluded judge, dear one.
Your arrival, a gift, is looked for tonight.

You’re the king of the tilted crown, the drunk sight.
What do I care of Caesar and Emperor tonight?

My tears trace the contours of your name:
I stand in Hallaj’s place tonight.

My heart desires your eyes. That’s why
All is savage, wild, and distant tonight.

Did you just wake up? Are your eyes confused?
Are they always so? Or simply drunk tonight?

Your distance has me keening like a nightingale.
Your arrival makes a whole world rejoice tonight.

The eyelash army, armed with eyebrow swords—
Is defeated by separation and waiting tonight.

If dear ones ask after Kurdi’s state,
In the corner, with no one, he is abandoned tonight.

 

2.

There; from Sawa Spring, a bouquet of girls descends,
Odds and evens, cranes and geese, arrayed in lines.

Hair on parade, laid over each breast,
Snakes over the treasures they guard.

A harvest of girls come to blind my eyes,
But my slim fawn isn’t among them.

These beauties—what are they to me?
My beauty isn’t among them.

Yes, they bring no peace to these unsettled insides.
I am murdered, captive, melancholy over my love.

The proverb, carved in stone: your one heart,
Don’t give it to a thousand.

God, I’m lonely. Today is a black day.
I wonder who stood in the way.

Or does my love spurn me?
God forbid—is he sick? What has happened to him,

Oh, stalker, that singular flower
I picked from this bouquet.

The sharp step of my sight burns with distance from my love.
Mouths run with blame like the waters of Sarchinar.

Qadir is qadir. With my eyes, I worship my Qadir.
So, Kurdi will never escape this trap.

 

 3.

Oh, raw pearl in the crown of kings that lead the world’s lands,

The sky’s perfect sun, the candle at the mystics’ feast,

Hidden, famous, hundreds like me are in love with you.

The bodies of the world ache with separation from you.

You asked if my heart is taken up or given away,

If love, affection and desire is in my mind.

Really, this is a sweet question, but it’s better

Addressed to a wise man who knows how it is.

My heart is bent on holding off my own concerns.

How can I untie the knots you bring me?

If you ask after his home, his form, his clothes, his nature—

He lives between the prison and the gristmill of Ahan.

He is tan, of slim stature and middling height, under a tilted hat,

Fresh chested, pale and threadbare, drunken eyes, bowed brow,

Wise, knowing, polite, wild, proud and swift; sometimes

He says, “Pain to all lovers,” other times, “I sacrifice my eyes for you.”

He has a quick, sure step,

His eyes always drunk, languid.

At times, he is wicked, oppressive,

Other times kind, sweet-tongued.

So, any place you can make a fist, ask him

To reveal the hidden secret, which he will, entirely.

If you walk the path with Qadir, he will have your answers,

But Kurdi can’t even explain his own state.

 

4.

The heart became a captive. I’d say he’s past healing.

He is subdued, fatigued; sorrow’s hands won’t let him go.

He was helpless, no one to visit, to assuage his sorrow,

To lighten the load of his illness, to keep sorrow from taking him.

Good news: at my beloved’s arrival my heart took flight.

Bad luck: he flew into a trap, tight as three hundred knots.

In the river of loneliness, which is drought, his departure,

The heart’s load, is lost.

The scout is tired.

He is halfway down and won’t come farther.

My eyes, my ears, all four paths are open to

The barking of dogs or the glittering of a fire.

I close the paths to the old country; in this wilderness,

There’s no kindness from Qadir, the fog won’t lift.

Sorrow pours down from the clouds of hardship.

The winds of misery can’t raise the tent of my heart, my pleasure.

In the mouth of illness, the heart moans.

The smug mouth, affected, lays out loyalty’s carpet.

Day and night, he is wicked, useless,

His only work: idle speech.

He caused me to lose my way.

He knows: he will remain, undying.

I’ve never, not once, confronted

Such fearsome service required for love.

I should use this hemistich to record this historical date.

Kurdi, sit mute in the lap of inability until

The able guide comes to see you through.

The translations are by Alana Marie Levinson-LaBrosse. In a few instances, I have made minor adjustments to the wording of her translations, but full credit for translating the collection belongs to her.