Tina Kozin

I caught sight of my long shadow and

realised I carry the sun on my back

Prevedla: Špela Drnovšek Zorko

this is where poetry’s written

but all you want is prose

everyone’s always had their face including the immortal

poet watching me from behind the mike

who whispers don’t be afraid don’t be afraid this time

totally present in top form embodied

in absence itself not only the word or verse

recorded for all time

how starlike the daffodils speak how

inquisitive the self-sufficient lunacy of poets

and how papery the leaves which

bearded slovenian bugs stroll on

across the ocean you are but all you want is prose

you are everything

but prosaic

is a time when something is

nowhere to be found

—for example—

I can’t find Jarrett in Tokyo

Prevedla: Špela Drnovšek Zorko

on top of a hill

moist mowed

grass

a finger

extended in the glow

of lights beneath it    

a town or village

(twilight sinks

into something            )                                             

a gust of fog

under the feet

earth

on it ageing

game tracks

in the dense darkness

all disappears

something speaks instinctually 

you are only when                 

you are most not                                                                  

morning

opens its eyes

again

Prevedla: Špela Drnovšek Zorko

and then what is this picture like

he asks himself the dark yet soft sea

the calm already passing into dream on the still     

lazy wave it lays itself against the drenched shore

the stone is softened not by salt but by the heat

the sun is pulled into a crowing horizon the glow

of yellow has eaten its fill of the crust sunken

into red and violet the sky chases a sleepy

shape above the cloud of blue grey cliffs

so there is depth just as there is

gentle nostalgia surpassing kitsch

yet both surrender to the solitude of a pair

of old ski boots on the back of the gravel

the left knocked over while the right still stands

licking the edge of the water with its end

Prevedla: Špela Drnovšek Zorko

in a white point

they adjoin

the rear ends of deer               

 Prevedla: Špela Drnovšek Zorko

no sleeping car is without a compartment,

the landscape always blurred as it

moves. the breathing of a stranger, another

passenger, inaudibly bounces off the walls

in a space that’s mine also, the steady

departure of sound has drowned out

the fading light—two rhythms, not alone,

continually travel without each other, and with no

increase there would be no darkness either,

clinging to the glass, mirror-like.

here shadows dart and flicker, though not

the stories that wove them. if one was

there, they all would be, just like the one

earth has countless different boundaries. the lights,

still fleeting, announce a station; I know this:

if I’m fortunate in changing my trains, I’ll arrive

where I started this journey.

 Prevedla Julija Potrč

Pomoč pri prevodu Rawley Grau

only the summer shakes itself

like a ripe mulberry tree, which is

dioecious. and the branching

sky will always be least

distant, unreachable too is 

the sunken breathing of the valley

beneath the plain. the horizon vanishes

in contours, the haze behind them

is perhaps a continent, but that is

where the fjords indent. these are windblown  

parts, and what stands is but a sole tree       

trunk. each leaf feels it. and all                    

those unconceived fruits. its shadow

circles unrepeatably. and these leaden

movements of the wind that carries

too much air. and if the rock did not

thin, no cave would blossom

from the undulating union of sea and wind.

it is unclear where the root goes, but

though this cave may be minute it rings

as if all the pouring junctions of time flowed

within it. this is an island, every direction    

is inaccessible fragmented

shore. and the overhang stratifies into

an edge, where a path comes to meet it.

but the view is a gaze that does not

pause, and here distance is vulnerable.

Prevedla: Špela Drnovšek Zorko

I don’t take a set path

up the nearby slopes. I know the place, know where

and how it ascends. here the tree line

is low, the steep terrain undercutting trees

before the first peak. that’s where I’m headed,

crawling more than walking up the scree:

where the rock is eroding the foot is unsure, occasionally

sinking and melting with the crushed sounds

of rock debris. almost imaginary, they die away before outlining

the boundaries of the space – the vastness comes to life

where even echoes fall silent. inconspicuously,

the crumbling terrain shifts behind my footsteps, only rarely is the silence

swept away by a rolling rock; no danger,

there’s no one behind me. only later on the rock face, my breathing

becomes softer and more regular as it slows between cols

and my hand glides over the rock: two different forms

of transience. I try to clutch the piton, the hand

seems ancient, so motionless is it; any peak I reach will be

below me, with more horizons opening behind me.

without turning I see that height gains most

with mountains. unpierced by permanence, it simply comes

into existence with them—intangible, almost comprehensible.

 Prevedla Julija Potrč

Pomoč pri prevodu Rawley Grau