Migration Ballads
A Poet's Journey

Migration Ballads embraces the reader with a symphony of natural sound which purifies the inner world. It is the poet, gusts of wind from the Taurus Mountains, days and nights spreading out and a harvest of dreams. Happily, it is the sea bitten off and kissed by the moon. It is the color of death. And it is as if you could listen to all of this in the distilled voice of an old timer, or from the heavenly host of the mountains themselves.


Umit Sariaslan, poet, writer, critic, Turkey





Vivid, engaging poems! These poems take you many places, visually, tactilely, and emotionally.


R. Bruce Bickley, Jr., Griffith T. Pugh Professor of English, Emeritus, Florida State University, USA





Poets have neither a home, nor a town, nor a country. Their real places are the mountains, the rocks, the valleys, the trees, the swings, the kites. As you will see, Ali F. Bilir is standing up on his tasseled kites and/or magic carpets and flying around among the wondering stars.


M. Ali Sulutas, researcher, writer, Turkey





Ali F. Bilir is a poet who uses clear language and complex syntax. He is good with language, a poet somewhat difficult to translate. . . like Apollinaire.


Mustafa B. Yalciner, researcher, writer, Turkey





Ali Bilir is a true poet. His last name means one who knows; one who is insightful...


Farideh Hasanzadeh-Mostafavi, poet and translator, Iran





To me, the poems are the way of breathing. Thank you for giving me a fresh, colorful, and deep breath.


Arzu Gungor, educational researcher, Florida State University, USA





Editing the poetry of Ali Bilir as translated from Turkish by M. Ali Sulutas has been an honor, like speaking to the soul of a friend you have never met, like finding a window no one has discovered into the work of Lorca, or Vallejo. These wonderful poems were given to me by Bilir's daughter, Defne, reminding me I am also the daughter of a poet whose first book I published, reminding me that poetry travels around the world from friend to friend, family to family, soul to soul.


Susan Bright, poet, publisher, USA