Turkish
Delight
Into the Eastern
lands of Anatolia
Hemmed around by
ragged Turquoise coastlines
Through the narrow
Dardanelles
Amid the seas of
Black and Marmara
To Aegean and
Mediterranean
Across the
Bosphorus via Istanbul
No longer
Constantinople, nor yet Byzantium
Sentinelled by soaring
Aya Sofia
Once a church
turned to mosque
Now monument and
testament
To a long and
bloody history
And inland a rugged
landscape
Of ancient
theatres and temples
The
architectural artefacts
And stony
remnants of many races
From warlike
Hittites and their foes
Phrygians,
Hellenes, Lycians and their ilk
Greeks, Romans,
Kurds and Gypsies
Through many caliphates
And Ottomans of
Empire
To the modern
state
And legacy of
Ataturk
Once, out of
mankind’s nursery
In the basin of
Tigris and Euphrates
And unknown distant
places in the East
Along the
ancient silk-road trading route
Carrying cargoes
of gold and precious metals
Opium, silks and
spices
Knowledge and
know-how
Astronomy and
astrology
And mystical religions
Came the camel-trains
Calling at the
caravanserais
To break their
arduous trek
Towards their
Western markets
And now the
groves of fruits and olives
The piles of
teas and spices
The gemstones
and the carpets
The flocks of
goats and sheep
And the colours,
sounds and smells
Of Turkish
tastes and flavours
In the bazaars
and hamams
Assault the very
senses
Yet can give no
explanation
Of this modern
ethnic melting-pot
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