Translation:İstiklâl Marşı (2)

by Mehmet Akif Ersoy

For other English-language translations of this work, see İstiklâl Marşı.

Fear not! This crimson flag rippling in the twilight will never fade,

The last hearth burning above my nation,

It is my nation’s star, it will shine,

It is mine and for my nation solely.

Frown not coy crescent for I am ready to die for you

Smile upon my heroic race. Why this anger? Why this wrath?

(Frown not) lest our blood shed for you be unblessed.

It is the right of my nation, who worships Truth; Independence!

From the beginning I have lived free and I will live free,

What lunatic claims he will shackle me? I’m astonished!

I’m like a roaring flood; I will trample my barrier and surmount it.

I’ll tear the mountains, even oceans won't contain me and I will erupt.

If horizons of the west is surrounded by a steel plated wall,

I have a frontier like my bosom full of faith!

Let it howl, do not be afraid, how can it throttle a faith such as this?

What you call "The Civilized (World)" is but a monster with only a single tooth left.

My friend, do not allow scoundrels to tread (cause disaster) in my homeland,

Make your body a shield (renounce yourself in jihad), and stop this shameless flow (attack on ourselves)

There will come the days your lord has promised you (of His bounty)

Who knows? Maybe tomorrow, maybe sooner than tomorrow.

Do not pass over the ground you walk on and think of it as only dirt! Recognise (ponder over it)

Think about the thousands lying under it un-shrouded (dumped, not given a proper burial)

You are the descendant of those who died in the path of your Lord (martyrs), don’t alter this (tradition), it would be a pity.

Even if you were to attain the worlds, do not give up this heavenly nation.

Who wouldn’t sacrifice themselves for this land, beautiful like paradise?

If you squeezed earth, martyrs would gush out of it!

Let God, the saviour of souls, take my soul, my beloved, my everything;

but only let him not separate me from my homeland, ever!

My soul’s request from you is only this:

Let not the bosom of my temple be touched by strange hands

It is these adhans, whose shahadas are the foundation of The Religion,

That should eternally echo(wail) above my nation.

Then ecstatically one-thousand prostrations – if I should have any sense

With every surge, My Lord, emptied (forgotten) are my painful years,

My soul will gush out as if from the purist of man (because God forgives the previous sins with the first drop of blood spilt for his cause in struggle (Jihad))

Than maybe I will be raised to arsa (The highest level of heaven)

So ripple now like the twilight oh glorious crescent moon

Blessed now be every drop of blood I drop for you

There is never an end for you, no submission for my race

Freedom is the right of my flag (nation) who has lived free,

It is the right (of my nation), who worships God. My nation’s Independence!