Prof. Forsberg's Escape from Turkey

I am an international scholar and jazz musician who has lived and worked abroad for some thirteen years now. I came to Turkey in 2014 with my wife Cholpon and our two small children, Acacia and Attila. We came with only the best of intentions. The kids learned Turkish and so did Cholpon. She planned to enter medical school this fall and at the university where I was hired as a full professor in the Department of Western Languages and Literatures, Karabuk University, Turkey, and in the heart of Anatolia. We had a good life until the failed coup attempt of 15 July 2016 when I was falsely charged with "aiding and abetting a terrorist organization," imprisoned, tried for high treason, cleared of all charges, released, and then summarily fired by my university for "aiding and abetting a terrorist organization," regardless. I might not have been charged but I posted a series of poems on my Facebook page in defense of my foreign colleagues who were targetted for no other reason than the fact that they were foreigners. Distinguished scholars from all over the world have posted letters of support, as well as famous jazz musicians with whom I have worked or am fortunate to call my friends. Fearful that I would be arrested a second time, the idea being, to make an example of me as an American citizen, I had no choice but to flee Turkey (or else). Presently, I do not have the financial means to get my wife and kids out of the country and need your help. The money raised would be used to bring them safely to the United States or Central Asia (Cholpon's native country) and then to help us to begin anew. Without your fiancial assistance, we stand to lose everything as a consequence of the shameful behavior of a so-called institution of higher learning in Turkey.
Clyde Forsberg
July 28 at 8:56am · Karabük · 

"Hocam (teacher) will they torture me?"

I can't get it out of my head
The look on her face
As the tears streamed down her pale cheeks 
Unimaginable
That such might need to be spoken
Aloud
In a crowded place
On a university campus of all places
At a campus cafe 
Amid the din of student iphones and faculty coffee-cups 
Rattling ceramic and tinkling silverware
Expressionless faces taking a break from class
The faint air of cigarettes
Pastries 
Pretense attempting to conceal a deep-seated national unease
As if everything is somehow normal
Like it used to be
That "it" will not touch them, most important
At least not today

Drink up
Eat up
Smile a nervous smile
Laugh to keep from crying
Stare into space
Look into the abyss

If course, everything is far from normal
And "it" will touch everyone before all is said and done
Those "it" doesn't touch?
Will assuredly be touched most of all
This is what no one seems to understand
Except two colleagues
A teacher and former student 
Weeping in public
Making a spectacle of themselves
They Understand
As they embrace and sob
In disbelief
That it is the end of something

I can't get her out of my head
Her plaintiff cry and fear of being tortured
If it comes to that
If she can't explain herself
A colleague
Or rather, "former" colleague
Targeted
Suspended
Investigated
Accused of "terrorism"
Not the only one
Not the last one, either

A terrorist?
No!
A teacher!
Yes!
Most assuredly!!
In what universe is a teacher a terrorist?
And a good one
A teacher, that is
A great one, actually.
Locked out of her office, regardless
Terrified
And not wrong to be frightened
To fear the worst

"Hocam (teacher) will they torture me?"

Every day the list of accused grows larger
Lives, careers, families destroyed with a single swipe of then pen
Locksmiths the emissaries of injustice
Brown envelopes how the ominous and incredulous is dispatched
Indeed, the worst of all possible academic worlds

Planets collide as the university is sucked into a black hole

Gather your things and wait for the worst
Don't leave the country

Wait
Wait
Wait

"Hocam (teacher) will they torture me?"

First it was twenty
Then forty
Now over sixty
And in a matter of days
Some say it will be eighty or more before the end
But will it end?
That is the real question
Before the number is in the hundreds
Thousands
Milliions

Don't talk to "them"
The targeted
The "coup plotters"
Don't be seen with "them"
Stand in line next to "them"
Or you will be next
Counted among "them"
Be investigated
And You don't want that
Mistaken for one of "them"

Do you?
Do you?
Do you?

"Hocam (teacher), will they torture me?"

I didn't believe her when she said they would come for her
It was just the day before
We joked
Laughed at the prospect
Planned our courses together
Assumed that reason would prevail
In a place that claims to be built on such a foundation
But she also knew better
That they would come for her, regardless
I assured her, in my wisdom, that it would not happen
Could not happen
For they dare not
It belied common sense
Reason
Human decency

But to this she explained, simply
"They will not come for you hocam (teacher)"
"You are an American"
"You are from Canada"
"They know better"
"But me?"
"They can do as the please."

Then, let them come for me.
Let them prepare a new brown envelope with my name on it
Let them replace the lock on my office door
Let them call their kangaroo court to order

Sevgili öğrenci (my dear student), will they torture us?