Ekaterina Josifova

He wrote that poem

We forgave him his earlier dirty tricks 

He played new ones

We did not forgive him the poem.

Prevedla Donna Martell

It whistled, passed by

in dashed

the silence, the field,

the crickets,

the railroad ties, the stars

I have not forgotten the longing

and the peace

Prevedla Donna Martell

Knowledge.

Even prouder

Ignorance

Prevedla Donna Martell

The man on the bench with the knapsack at his feet

lies in wait for listeners.

He’s talking of some home, roving in some past

or maybe future

The air already smells of snow.

I have to take the children home, I say.

The man keeps silent, roving.

Night approaches, something peaceful, but too vast.

Prevedla Donna Martell

When the time comes

no one nowhere to understand my language

and it reunites with the dead

not languages but people

who have never pitied themselves

late begun to be loved by me

I’ll have the chance to nurse them

to talk to them

to not talk.

Prevedla Donna Martell

what is worth being said,

if not today, at least tomorrow.

Or some day.

What hasn’t been noted down

lurks beneath the bones

of my Jurassic period,

it smoulders beneath the layers

of my Pliocene:

my nameless beast.

Prevedla Donna Martell

Because there isn’t bad weather.

Never mind that yesterday I said the opposite.

Because I chose which way to go. So,

it’s not at all important that I be the one to arrive.

Because I may turn aside,

follow someone’s trail

choose some door, knock at it,

ask for a part time job,

in passing

on foot.

Prevedla Donna Martell

what I know. I know

my own language.

Yes, I am concerned about it.

Yes, I sit around much more.

Yes, I have hope.

For ecologists too.

Prevedla Donna Martell

When it is light and plain

like a whitewashed house in the field—

a plank-bed for lovemaking, wine

for guests, a flower on the window sill

when it is a house in the field,

even life is enough to tackle:

beautiful is the sky, it feels

beautiful with my shackles.

Prevedla Donna Martell

Nor yet in love

It snows outside the window

It piles up quietude

The poem will pass that way

When I’m not looking.

Prevedla Donna Martell

He hasn’t watered.

He hasn’t nurtured.

He’s not that sort of man.

He’s not my man.

Prevedla Donna Martell

from the place where I am:

a little hollow between two waves

of the rising earth.

I’m guessing about this or that;

I prefer

to give in to the naïve light.

Then I feel calm, as if someone

confirms by nodding

my secret hopes.

Prevedla Donna Martell

the Puszta

the steppe

light from all directions

I only made a step

I was merely touched

by the blast

beneath the sky

across the earth

roving

Scythians

a skete

Hungary, lend a horse!

Russia, lend wolves!

Prevedla Donna Martell

a childhood hand-in-hand with any age

narrow bodies

overfilled by bottomless springs

a continuing beginning

this is not a memory

it is abiding in the untraversable land

untraversable timelessness

Prevedla Donna Martell

beneath the snow, each regime

is breeding its own riot.

Prevedla Donna Martell

They broke

On Wednesday I think it’s Wednesday but

It may be Tuesday or tomorrow  

It’s no big deal

They were for seeing far

For that one needs eyes

Fresh and untaught.

Prevedla Donna Martell

let us honor the gifts,

let us cut quinces into the wine,

let us serve the salty grapes of the memories.

We have experienced as much as we could—

pain walks along with joy,

which annulls the doom.

We have used both shouts and words,

we won’t hurt the earth with them,

but we may just as well keep silent for a while, like old friends.

Iz bolgarščine prevedla Donna Martell

For poetry.

For the sake of living.

For the sake of anarchy.

For the sake of movement.

In all directions.

For the sake of truthfulness

Greater than the truths.

Prevedla Donna Martell

A cribber off excellent dead students

an eavesdropper in market-places, a thief

with pockets full of crib notes because of bad memory

little slips of paper for cribbing

crib notes for prompting

and who will shame me, who will catch me,

who will begin to leaf through all the books

to guess all the smells

to dig in the dustbins

crib notes for breakfast

crib notes with the taste of coffee

melting crib notes in the bathroom

crib notes carried away in my sleep

by the cold water of waking up

and right on them I wrote it down!

Prevedla Donna Martell

It locks you up, ideally, in a solitary cell

with something to play, for instance, a violin,

and tells you: you’ll get out of here when you start playing;

or in a cell with a Chinaman:

you’ll get out when you begin to speak Chinese.

It never asked me

to write a poem.

It did me some good, though:

I can repair my hot plate.

I can dismantle my lock.

Prevedla Donna Martell

then there was a traffic jam,

then I missed the stop.

For that I also have an explanation:

it had grown quite dark outside,

in the mirror of the window my face looked

the way only you remember it.

I stared at it

Prevedla Donna Martell

Shadows fly past fast; wind rises;

the river doesn’t mirror the air anymore.

If you bend over the darkened water now

you might see the eye of a doe

that has sensed the danger lurking in the bush,

but still bends down

and drinks.

River, the anxiety of this hour is

in the blood, which knows.

When everything was future,

Ceaseless Water, we used to cross you knee-deep.

In the radiant ignorance of the youthful heart, once a falling star

scratched silently the night, I would pray

we all be on the same little ship

and enjoy our days.

Here, I am standing now, the sole witness

of my only life. The river

turns, former banks and faces

loom past,

tender light

dissolving in the dusk.

of mere walking.

It’s no indication.

It’s not signed.

Prevedla Donna Martell

through the small pocket of the cardigan,

that loosely knit one,

I shoot in the air, from below upwards;

in the bustle

no one looks at me,

no one suspects me,

no one remembers me—it’s quite convenient

to be oldish.

Prevedla Donna Martell

Blade against stone.

Sparks from under the blade.

I came with two meek kitchen knives,

but the grindstone knows otherwise.

Old, good is the steel:

drunk with force,

tempered in blood.

The grindstone has historical memory.

Prevedla Donna Martell

I listen for

the light breathing:

it is here: the childhood

with the serious little face

with scout’s senses

with the instincts of a thief

throughout a country that

will remain the only one

inhaled

tasted

traversed

with steps unfirm.

Prevedla Donna Martell

breathe

the same air

that’s been exhaled

for at least three billion years

we drink

water, which remembers

I pretty much guess

this bill will be on me.

Prevedla Donna Martell

It was one for the two of us; we shared it, passing it between us,

staring at the embers behind the open little door of the stove.

He said: it is good to remain

by oneself with the fire sometimes.

I said: let’s make something together.

He said: even though it may be a shack out of branches.

We lived in different cities; we travelled

towards one another.

It would happen:

wine and one glass. We would say to ourselves:

Cheers.

We did not give in to youth,

so why should we give in to old age?

Prevedla Donna Martell

doesn’t look very happy.

The Happy End

looks a little glum today.

Last night it didn’t dream

winning goals,

a crown of laurels,

or a cushion with medals;

it didn’t hear The Wedding March

or the righteous voice of retribution,

or the fish’s with the three wishes;

it didn’t open up the treasure cave

or the safe with the family valuables,

it didn’t read the Tablets,

it didn’t hail the movie’s Happy End.

Last night The Happy End

dreamed happiness.

Prevedla Donna Martell