Roses, Beggars and Vagabonds
(At Istanbul’s Bazaar)
A Story and Poem
Poetic Prose (in a half truth)
There was in time past sorcery and magic which were prevalent
and to be quite honest, I found it very much alive in the old realm of Istanbul…
The Story
I had just arrived at the Istanbul’s main bazaar (open market), on a visit to Asia Minor, it was 1996; and after a late lunch was walking with a few friends down one of the many halls—with merchants on each side of me, selling everything under the sun, to include: rugs, copper and brass items, glass like evil-eyes on chains, to keep the bad spirits and omens away. Opposite me, across the hall and walking the other way, was a short old lady, with a blind gaunt old man, she pulled him along with a rope tied around his wrist, and she kept looking at me intently, as I stood looking at her and him, as I stood, in my little group consisting of two men and three women, not including me. I found my eyes followed them, for it appeared to me after they had passed me, the woman alone in front of the man was carrying something in a little tied up pouch. I shuddered as I thought it might be something to curse another with. The woman had stopped and was looking at me with eyes that seemed to burst into flames. She walked across to the other side of the corridor and the fifty or so feet to me, without preface said:
“Why do you look so strange at me, even look so overcome?” I didn’t care to reply, and held back my answer. Her large and firewoman eyes were fixed eagerly upon me, as if she could, and was looking through me, from side to side and from first to last, and from end to end. I sensed I became a little embarrassed, wherefore she asked “Give me a coin! And I will not give you the evil-eye!”
“What do you mean?” I queried.
She answered ambiguously: “I will throw a curse on you before this hour tomorrow!”
Her answers and statement fascinated me, and she started to move away from me, in gaunt yet stately form, “I don’t believe in such powers of another person who believes in Christ, Jesus.”
“A rich soul,” she said and took off her cap reverently as she said:
“I will give you a letter in Gaelic, I can’t read it, for a coin, and drown the curse!”
As she spoke I looked round as though someone else was staring at me, a kind of second sight, which I think she had also (perhaps her little imp, ready to charge me at daybreak).
There stood the gaunt woman with a look of triumph on her face and the poetic prose on ancient paper in Gaelic, she knowing ahead of time such ancient scrolls interested me.
It is here, where the story overhangs, that is, where this old woman of bony features, reddish eyes, and sienna (yellowish) skin, of a black sorcery gneiss of the ancients, perhaps at one time been originally a wild one, there seemed to be an evidence of an old upheaval which must have shaken those around her, like it did to me at first, but broadly speaking she took several coins from me, and here is where we made our separation.
And the Poetic Prose (Letter)
(An old Gaelic Verse) (Translated by Dlsiluk):
Payment or benefit of cleric care that one and all persons were meant to receive, within this branch of sacred humanity—be that we are roses, or barbarians, vagabonds, and even beggars, but we die alike, and will receive the punishment afterward, for the days we’ve squandered in life: it is now foretold, declared and let forth by the authority of this letter that all curious minded people, in parish and parlors, that be of bitter felons, or procurators, going about in any country or countries within the realm—do not labile the kings or queens of earth, to those who have lawful games and crafty and subtle gaining schemes, to themselves who have knowledge of extraordinary things, palmistry or another absurd circus witchery, bear this in mind, for you know their destinies, deaths, turns, and other such things: satanically imaginations: and all the ecstasies a person soars for—bring your whole body of magic and labor having no land or master, nor bring any lustful merchandise to detain you, whereby he or she— might find their living, and give no rescoring to him or her, do not rob death of its lawful giving’s and getting’s…for heaven and hell will not forgive thee.
Notes: Poem: 2649 (11-5-2009) done in an Old English style or form of writing, when magic and sorcery were prevalent. Story: 510 (11-5-2009) Fiction with nonfiction, author went to Istanbul in 1996, met this old lady…
A Story and Poem
Poetic Prose (in a half truth)
There was in time past sorcery and magic which were prevalent
and to be quite honest, I found it very much alive in the old realm of Istanbul…
The Story
I had just arrived at the Istanbul’s main bazaar (open market), on a visit to Asia Minor, it was 1996; and after a late lunch was walking with a few friends down one of the many halls—with merchants on each side of me, selling everything under the sun, to include: rugs, copper and brass items, glass like evil-eyes on chains, to keep the bad spirits and omens away. Opposite me, across the hall and walking the other way, was a short old lady, with a blind gaunt old man, she pulled him along with a rope tied around his wrist, and she kept looking at me intently, as I stood looking at her and him, as I stood, in my little group consisting of two men and three women, not including me. I found my eyes followed them, for it appeared to me after they had passed me, the woman alone in front of the man was carrying something in a little tied up pouch. I shuddered as I thought it might be something to curse another with. The woman had stopped and was looking at me with eyes that seemed to burst into flames. She walked across to the other side of the corridor and the fifty or so feet to me, without preface said:
“Why do you look so strange at me, even look so overcome?” I didn’t care to reply, and held back my answer. Her large and firewoman eyes were fixed eagerly upon me, as if she could, and was looking through me, from side to side and from first to last, and from end to end. I sensed I became a little embarrassed, wherefore she asked “Give me a coin! And I will not give you the evil-eye!”
“What do you mean?” I queried.
She answered ambiguously: “I will throw a curse on you before this hour tomorrow!”
Her answers and statement fascinated me, and she started to move away from me, in gaunt yet stately form, “I don’t believe in such powers of another person who believes in Christ, Jesus.”
“A rich soul,” she said and took off her cap reverently as she said:
“I will give you a letter in Gaelic, I can’t read it, for a coin, and drown the curse!”
As she spoke I looked round as though someone else was staring at me, a kind of second sight, which I think she had also (perhaps her little imp, ready to charge me at daybreak).
There stood the gaunt woman with a look of triumph on her face and the poetic prose on ancient paper in Gaelic, she knowing ahead of time such ancient scrolls interested me.
It is here, where the story overhangs, that is, where this old woman of bony features, reddish eyes, and sienna (yellowish) skin, of a black sorcery gneiss of the ancients, perhaps at one time been originally a wild one, there seemed to be an evidence of an old upheaval which must have shaken those around her, like it did to me at first, but broadly speaking she took several coins from me, and here is where we made our separation.
And the Poetic Prose (Letter)
(An old Gaelic Verse) (Translated by Dlsiluk):
Payment or benefit of cleric care that one and all persons were meant to receive, within this branch of sacred humanity—be that we are roses, or barbarians, vagabonds, and even beggars, but we die alike, and will receive the punishment afterward, for the days we’ve squandered in life: it is now foretold, declared and let forth by the authority of this letter that all curious minded people, in parish and parlors, that be of bitter felons, or procurators, going about in any country or countries within the realm—do not labile the kings or queens of earth, to those who have lawful games and crafty and subtle gaining schemes, to themselves who have knowledge of extraordinary things, palmistry or another absurd circus witchery, bear this in mind, for you know their destinies, deaths, turns, and other such things: satanically imaginations: and all the ecstasies a person soars for—bring your whole body of magic and labor having no land or master, nor bring any lustful merchandise to detain you, whereby he or she— might find their living, and give no rescoring to him or her, do not rob death of its lawful giving’s and getting’s…for heaven and hell will not forgive thee.
Notes: Poem: 2649 (11-5-2009) done in an Old English style or form of writing, when magic and sorcery were prevalent. Story: 510 (11-5-2009) Fiction with nonfiction, author went to Istanbul in 1996, met this old lady…
posted by Dennis and Rosa Siluk at 2:14 PM
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