Turks Bearing Gifts

The other night I was on my way from Chi-town back to L.A., driving my old '75 Falcon beater when I started to nod off at the wheel. Since I preferred to stay alive rather then meet my maker in the form of a face to face with an International Harvester semi hauling a double box, I pulled off the road into some little Podunk and found my way to the only greasy spoon open at that hour.

The waitress had some pair of long sweet legs and a silk scarf around her neck. She served me the hottest cup of joe this side of a McDonald's tort claim. While I was stirring an ice cube into it I overheard her and the cook arguing about something to do with religion. I can't really tell you what it was about completely 'cause I couldn't hear everything.

And this geezer cook, well I say geezer because with his greasy fat belly overhanging his stained belt, he looked like 102 in the shade. But when I stared him in the peepers he seemed as young as a child, almost like a baby. He had the gaze of a dumb puppy. Hardly a shadow of awareness in it. I've seen lampposts with more of a glint in their eye.

But here's the thing. He gave me some kind of look like he thought we were in cahoots. Like I knew exactly what he was trying to say to the strange bird with the nice gams. Like he thought I must have agreed with him completely.

Go figure. I concluded he must be drunk.

I happened to have a piece of paper in my wallet with a poem on it that I'd gotten from a Turkish tailor I'd just paid a visit to in Chicago. I've been trying to track down his brother's ex-wife to give her some bad news. He had his daughter bring us some Turkish coffee while we talked. When I left he gave me this poem. He said I'd know what it was for when the time came.

So I left the coffee waitress a sawbuck wrapped up in the middle of it as a tip.

Seemed like the thing to do at the time.

Can't imagine what she made of it.

This was the Turk's poem:


NECESSARY LESSONS

Do not advise those who are not in love.
The unloving, like the insentient, cannot understand.

Do not distance yourself from the wise,
But avoid the shallow instead.

The ungiving disappoint God.
They cannot see his face.

Do not waste time on drab pigeons,
Who consort with moles,
Who avoid the deep diving loon.

Falcon and King, each praises the other.
Even a small falcon is a falcon still.

And if you wash some dark stone for fifty years,
You won't really transform it.

The hidden sun changes appearance.
Some say it ceases to be.
It never does.

Yunus, don't be stupid.
Mix with the mature.

A fool who talks of spiritual things is still a fool.


~Yunus Emre, Turkish poet, circa 1300