A Celebration of Roses: World Poetry Day at Bilkent
Photographs by Gülay Aydin (GRA/V)
Bilkent's Center for Turkish Literature celebrated UNESCO's World Poetry Day on March 21 with an event titled "The Rose in Turkish Poetry." It took place at C Block Auditorium from 5 to 6 p.m. and was attended by Department of Turkish Literature faculty members and students as well as many others fond of poems and roses.
Noting UNESCO's choice of date as a happy coincidence, in that March 21 is also the herald of spring, Prof. Semih Tezcan expressed his wish to delight the audience with roses, nightingales, syllables, verses and poems. Assoc. Prof. Nuran Tezcan then delivered a speech in which she addressed this flower's place in Divan poetry, reading rose-themed couplets by masters of the genre including Ahmet Paşa, Fuzulî, Bakî, Necatî, Şeyhülislam Yahyâ and Nedim, accompanied by her interpretations in modern Turkish.
Assoc. Prof. Tezcan then left the floor to Turkish literature students, who recited rose-themed poems by renowned Turkish poets of modern times including Behçet Necatigil, Ahmet Muhip Dranas, Sezai Karakoç, Yahya Kemal, Cemal Süreyya, Ahmet Haşim and Edip Cansever, as well as celebrated folk poets (ozans) such as Öksüz Âşık, Karacaoğlan, Gevherî, Ümmi Sinan and Meslekî.
Finally, while red roses were handed out to the audience, faculty member and acclaimed poet Hilmi Yavuz greeted all those who intend to write a poem on roses and closed this literary event by reading his quatrain dedicated to Bakî:
Oh master of glances, hero of hopes
You described the indescribable in a rose
As we began to grieve, we were your apprentices.
The Divan of Baki is the birds you put to flight.