Muğla, My Divided Pearl
Muğla, my beautiful pearl—
how I ache for your Greek side.
For the olive trees that spoke in ancient tones,
for the ghost of your temples
hidden behind hotel walls.
I love your silence,
the kind only ruins understand.
I love the wind
that still remembers
names no one dares to say.
But your Turkish side?
I despise it.
Not the people,
but the masks,
the erasure,
the pride built on silence
and conquest repainted as care.
You are one land
with two souls,
and only one was allowed to breathe.
Why haven’t they split you
like they split Cyprus?
Was your grief too quiet?
Was your stone too soft?
They carved others.
Why not you?
Or maybe you were too precious—
too layered to dissect.
So instead,
they smothered your history
and sold your beaches.
But I remember.
I remember the language
etched into your soil,
and I won’t let them
call you simple,
call you whole,
when you are clearly torn.
Muğla,
my pearl,
you deserved honesty.
And they gave you silence.