translated, from the Turkish, by Randy Blasing and Mutlu Konuk

Loving you is like eating bread dipped in salt,

like waking feverish at night

      and putting my mouth to the water faucet,

like opening a heavy unlabeled parcel

      eagerly, happily, cautiously.

Loving you is like flying over the sea

for the first time, like feeling dusk settle

      softly over Istanbul.

Loving you is like saying “I’m alive.”