Selahattin Demirtaş and Figen Yüksekdağ were elected co-presidents of the People’s Democratic Party (HDP) in 2014. They were both arrested at their homes in November 2016 on allegations that were linked to the PKK. Although the European Court of Human Rights has strongly condemned this arrest, declaring it to be of an “incontestable consequence against democracy”, the co-presidents are still being illegally detained.
Since he’s been imprisoned, Selahattin Demirtaş has published eight books including Dawn published by Penguin Books.
Letter from Selahattin Demirtaş to the Commission in charge of reading prison correspondence
1st of May 2017,
Dear Commission! I write to you from an F-type1 cell. If you were to ask “Why?”, it’s because I am imprisoned! I can hear you say “We know that, but why are you writing to us? Our eyes are tired from reading your letters!” and this is exactly what I am writing to you about. What a strange job you have chosen! Reading other people’s letters! You probably get paid for that too (It turns out you get paid 2060 liras a month, you can spend without counting!) But this isn’t our subject. Although, I’m not exactly sure what our subject is (I hope you won’t cross out the last sentences because they were borrowed/ stolen from one of İlhami Algör’s stories)
Now that I have succeeded in distracting you, let me dive into the subject. The ones outside (or more precisely the ones who think they’re outside), have asked me for one more story. And I told them that the commission in charge of reading correspondence is in crisis ever since I came to prison. I don’t think I should send long letters anymore. Because of me, they work “like slaves” just to be able to feed themselves. Moreover, I’m not even a writer. Although, when growing up with an artist for a mother and poet for a father, one does pick up a few things.
When I was young, we always woke up to the sound of my mother playing the piano. Our house had two rooms, all of us siblings shared one room. My mother’s piano was there too. My dear mother would relentlessly sit in front of her piano every morning and play it. Believe me when I say those sounds are still resounding in my ears. When I grew up, my mother said to me : “Are you stupid boy, what piano? That’s a sewing machine. I work as a seamstress to earn a little bit extra money for the household. But anyway, I listened to it just as I would have listened to a piano after all, didn’t I? Dear Commission, may Allah preserve your people, if you want your children to have an ear for music, don’t have them listen to songs but rhythms instead. If Arif Sağ became a virtuoso, it’s thanks to the mill in his village.
As for my father, he spoke in poems. He spoke beautifully. As I grew up, I realised those weren’t poems but swear words. He was foulmouthed and good-humoured, he still is. But there are some people who can swear without seeming rude. That’s how my father is, the swear words coming out of his mouth are just like poems. One time, as he spoke without swearing, one of his friends took offense. “What’s up Tahir, did I do something wrong?” he asked but was relieved when my father replied “You bastard, what could you have done wrong?” This is how my cultural foundations were built, little by little, until I started school.
I went to Yeni İlkokulu in Diyarbakır. I was a studious student and I did well, very well. But I wasn’t first. Because Bahir was first. Bahir was the most studious, the most brilliant student of the class. He was first, I was second. He was neat, organised, had a pretty hand writing and was well-behaved. I had a little bit of all of those things. I had a lot of friends at school, Bahir only had one and it was me. Bahir’s family came to Diyarbakır from another city, or that’s how I remember it. No one could touch him, because I was there. I was some sort of president (the co-presidency didn’t exist then) to a small scale tough “gang”. Though we soon realised our “gang” wasn’t that tough, there were much tougher ones out there, anyway…
I don’t remember much about Bahir, the one thing I remember very clearly is something that happened as we were walking back home from school. We were hungry and tired, strolling down the narrow streets, when Bahir suddenly said :
“oooohhhh the nice smell of pastima2.
– The smell of what?
– Of pastirma, pastirma.
– What’s pastirma?
– Pastirma man, you know the meat.
– What’s that like?
– It’s thinly sliced, it smells, you know.
– Hahahaaaa, what’s pastirma? We call that pirzola.3 There’s no such thing as pastirma, man.”
I made fun of Bahir the entire way home. But Allah exists and Bahir didn’t take offense, he didn’t stop talking to me nor did he insist. I had never seen pastirma in my life, I hadn’t even seen someone talk about pastirma. When I got home, I told my mother (the pianist) about it, I was laughing so much. And she said “boy, there is such a thing as pastirma”. I choked on my laughter. Forgive me Bahir, I couldn’t tell you.
I think it was two months after I had been imprisoned. I awoke suddenly one night. It was four in the morning. I was dreaming. I my dream, Bahir told me “The pastirma, don’t forget the pastirma.” It was truly hard to believe. I couldn’t decide wether I was awake or still dreaming. Exactly 35 years later, my friend Bahir, still a child, reminded me of something in a dream I had in an F-type cell. As you know, we prepare weekly lists for the canteen of the prison. That same morning, we had decided with Abdullah Zeydan that we would treat ourselves to some pastirma that week. I got out of bed and went to see the canteen list downstairs. Indeed, we had forgotten to add pastirma to the list. I thanked Bahir and wrote it down.
I don’t know how we came here, but you see Dear Commission. They keep insisting that I send them a story from prison but I said I couldn’t, I said I don’t want to be unfair to the Commission officers. I am after all very respectful of labour and labourers. I just wanted to inform you of the situation. I wish you courage at work and success in your professional endeavours. With all my respects.
During my imprisonment, the only time I have felt a deep sadness was that night. I only remember Bahir as a child because we lost touch after primary school. I hadn’t heard from him at all. If I remember correctly, about ten years ago, as I was quickly glancing through the newspaper, an article caught my eye: “Dicle University employee committed suicide.” It was accompanied by a blurry photograph. I didn’t read it in detail and moved on. But I stopped suddenly and went back to it. I was stupefied, at first I thought it must be someone else with the same name, but it was him on the picture. I promised myself I would find his family and commiserate with them, but I couldn’t find them. It pained me. I couldn’t find them, but Bahir found me years later in a cell, in a dream. Forgive me Bahir, rest in peace my beautiful brother. You were always the first, you will always remain the first in my heart, I couldn’t tell you that.
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