On A Friday Evening, Shanghai Streets Poem by Ulas Basar Gezgin

A Friday evening, Shanghai streets
Only the sky is deserted, it must be the pollution.

Aunts are doing taichi
Uncles are absorbed in their dance.
Half fantasy half real, the portable speaker,
quite successfully indeed,
in the way speaking its own mind,
although tied to a shopping cart.
However, you cannot raise your voice too much in this part of the world.
If that voice has to come out by any means, then it shouldn't be yours.
Here he comes to volume down the speaker,
A police and a city officer.

Suddenly we are curious
after we hear the loud talks,
of the many people, gathered around.
First you think they are having a quarrel.
'Farewell' it is called, you learnt.

But the lady who fights with smart phone seller
doesn't look like she's saying good bye;
It is not a beginning either
Here it seems all the topics have been consumed up
The stupidity of smart phones (of the humans, perhaps!)
is the reason for a fight.
Who is smart? Who is stupid?
Let's ask then, which people
live like someone else's phone
or pretend to live?

A Friday evening, Shanghai streets,
small restaurants are still open
Beside the shopping centers, among the giant malls.
Into the engines of these skyscraper cities,
These shops do not appear to be the fodder yet, till when will this continue? ...

Street karaoke, street performance, street dance…
Electronic gadget sellers, barbers, galleries, bookstores.
Animal zoos and human fields,
a wedding palace, right across from the circus (coincidence?) .
On TV, feast for the children
Partially cloudy sky, resembling Mecidiyeköy
Traditional tea and teapots are having a war
against the KFC, Mc Donald's, Burger King and Starbucks.
The trees in the park are not chopped off yet.
Subway did not become the home for the homeless yet.

I sat in a Gansu restaurant.
Perhaps there won't be a place to sit
when I come to this island of buildings next time.

'This apartment is 2 million dollars.' says the uncle
Sighs while trying to sell Mao's red book.
I say 'trying to sell' because
There is no more faith in the redness of the books.
The days of 'I read a book and my entire life changed.'
Were left behind and replaced by
'Mind Games'

This city is like the Pandora's Box, like the Atlas Globe
It must be carried on the back, but who knows
if having back pain is a good sign or not?
Whoever leads them to the streets is from where destiny comes too.
As they say the three mountains keep rising constantly,
prices increase exponentially.
The mountain of education, the mountain of health, the mountain of retirement.

The umbrellas with handles of samurai sword
will make the high skies angry, won't they?
What about the jade king, our master?

We have to admit that The Middle Kingdom changed a lot.
If we look at the capricious picture of the country
You will see the fireworks replacing the red stars.
Is it because of this or is this the reason behind
the frivolous coinbox-like conditions of the youth?

But still, in this jig-saw destructiveness
can we find the dynamism of the history's engine?
Will the Chinese peasants mint their coins again
when they rebel against the governors?
Is this soil still fertile
to grow the trees of hope?
The answer of the question becomes visible when you look at the bans.
Because the bans in any country
are the good indicators of the rulers' fears.

Unlucky 4,14,24,144.
Will it stop once it completes the cycle?
If the hour of birth is at the lucky time
Will it sink quicker, like Atlantis?
And of course like Titanic,
'The Dynasty of Thieves'

The filth of the cities is galore.
The villages surrounded by skyscrapers.
Horizontal villages become vertical.
'I am an urbanite' they are forced to say
But it does not happen when you say it.
They never thought about this.

Even though sewers flow to the main arteries,
Even though they mix with veins,
Whoever cleans this city
will clean the entire country.
Once the fireworks are extinguished,
That wedding ammunition
will let the lanterns with moon cakes
fly into the fogs of pollution.

And from the ashes of these rising buildings
A new world will emerge, very new,
the one Ai Ching yearns for.
Surely one thousand brave hearts can be found at that time,
to fight with the most ferocious dragons.

Nothing else is written or will be written
in the Chinese history.




Ulas Basar Gezgin,8-11 November 2013, Shanghai, China
Translated by Ali Rıza Arıcan,19.11.2016