Original text - Turkish - Bu şehir yerden bile ağır bu gece...

Uzman olarak şiirini çevirebilen tek kişi benim, ama şiiri tam anlayamıyorum. Türkçede biraz açıklayabilirsen iyi olur.

Merhaba kafetzou, mesajını yeni gördüm.

Şiirin açıklaması şöyle:

Bu şehir yerden bile ağır bu gece (Bu şehir bu gece yerden bile daha ağır)

Altında tek bir ölü olsun kalmamış (şehrin altında tek bir ölü bile kalmamış/yok)

Ölenlerdir incelten hafifleten oysa
Uçacakmış gibi yapan şehirleri
(ama şehirleri uçacakmış gibi ince ve hafif yapan ölülerdir/ölülerin kendisidir)

şu da benim çevirdiğim hali, belki yardımı olur:
this city is heavier than the ground tonight
even a dead underneath it remained not
but it's the dead that makes cities thin and light
as if to take flight
(sadece sonlarında uyak var ama çok şiirsel değil)
bu açıklama yardımcı oldu mu?

Mesajımı yeni bıraktım!

Açıklaman yardımcı, ama anlayamadığım birşey daha var - ne demek şehirin altındaki ölüler? Neden şehirin altında ölüler olsun ki?

Tantine, I think I need your help with this one. The requester has requested a poetic translation, and you're better at that than I am. Here's the translation, based on her own, but changed a bit:

This city is heavier even than the earth tonight
If there was one dead person underneath, no more
But it is the dying that make cities
Thin and light as if to take flight

CC: Tantine

herhalde şehrin mezarlığını kastediyor veya geçmişte altında gömülü olan şehirleri

Tamam - saÄŸol.

Hi Kafetzou

Thanks for your kind message.

I don't understand any Turkish at all, so I can only base myself on your translation to make any suggestions.

The first two lines are really good, I like the scansion. Do you think you could find a rhyme for "no more" for the end of the third line.

The fourth line seems to be too short.

Maybe we should make the third and fourth rhyme with the first line. That would kill two birds with one stone.

How about:

This city's so much heavier than the ground tonight
That even the dead wont stay
But it's death that makes cities thin and light
Thus allowing them to take flight.

Bises
Tantine

Hmm. Thanks, Tantine, but I think that may be too far from the original. I think I'll just put my version up and hope the requester is satisfied with it. I think rhyme would make it a bit too cute - the original doesn't rhyme.

Hi Kafetzou

Your translation seemed good anyway, as I said earlier.

If the original didn't rhyme then there is no reason that the translation does either, so the fact that your last line is shorter doesn't really "matter" either.

I must admit that I did this last night just after having been stung on the back of the knee by a hornet. Yikes, does that hurt!!!!! This probably had some effect on my capacities as a translator/poet.

But as I said, I like your own version anyway.

Bises
Tantine

Thanks, Tantine, and, as we say in Turkish, geçmiş olsun - may it be past (your hornet sting).

Well Kafetzou,

It hurt me for a few hours but I managed to avoid both an over swollen leg and an anaphylactic shock

Ice packs managed to avoid any swelling and Guillaume burned out the venom using the cigarette technique. You hold a lighted cigarette at about a hair's width from the sting, the heat destroys the venom (and burns off any "disgraceful" leg hair at the same time lol)

Bises
Tantine

Oh weird - I never heard of that!