Image credit: Katie Neece, "Still Life in Monaco", Oil on Canvas

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Mundus Inversus

Insatiable mice chew through my toes as if through wood

Pagan children beat their palms

Against sheepskin drumheads—

Death pulses through my temples

And a sun

Rises backwards as the seas drown

In the sky

Lilacs blossom

And feed bees of steel—

Blessing pregnant men who give birth to black cats—

Walking into the path of those who walk on all fours

And…

The grime of their feet is sweat of the forehead

That baptizes god in the house of man

 

 

Amulet 

Melancholic ballerinas dance over your head

And ravens in a deep sleep weigh heavy on your hair, A…

You haven’t drifted off to sleep but dreams poke your belly

And insects with glass wings have covered your face

And you, A

You’re still sad over the loss of feeling in your body

But A, don’t be...

We the mad don’t die in the shadows

Not before swallowing the sun and puffing icicles into the air

Not before hopping a train and heading off into manic rumblings

So that they may baptize you in the name of the father, the son, and the unholy spirit

And we aren’t quenched by fluorescent beauty

That you can’t caress or hold in your arms

Catch a whiff of its perfume or kiss its eyelids

Just see it from a distance and become sad from the bliss

Of being small, ever so small, swimming endless swirls of olive oil

 

Torrential rains fall on your chest, A

And you a slab of marble on a nameless road

On whose back tread muddied tires and bloodied feet

You’re still there you are you are

And a butterfly with softest wings breaks you to pieces

And you are no longer no longer

But, A...

We the mad don’t die in the shadows

The world dies solemnly for us

Don’t be sad, A

 

Love,

E.H.

 

 

Lucid Dream

She was just a kid

On her back they drew an emblem

A house with open windows and a chimney above

That blew smoke onto the years over her head

 

The turtle plods,

The turtle plods,

 

Green-eyed subjects frozen in photographs fade

Washed out portraits multiply across grey walls

Myths of loss in exemplary people

Consecrated as icons

Watching the living

From the wall

The living go in droves

In droves go the living

Planting nails in asphalt

To nail photographs

To walls

 

The turtle plods

The turtle plods

 

Someone bearing incense has entered the sketched house

Turned on the lights and thrown wood on the fire

The march has begun

The cups have been poured

Someone else is on the way

And a host of others behind her

“A celebration feast for a grave loss”

 

The turtle plods

The turtle plods

 

Its back freighted with tons

Headed toward the nail planters

Flying

To beg them to stop planting nails

“I’ve found the green-eyed ones

They’re in my house

Celebrating”

 

The turtle plods

The turtle plods

 

The heavy tread of footsteps made the city go dark

 

She noticed her own face frozen in the portrait of the icon

The nail planter drove a nail through it to reinforce the absence

Till tomorrow

 

The turtle plods

The turtle plods

 

Warm yourself around the fire of this home

The green-eyed girl said to the nail planter

Grab your doll and come play with me

 

 

Not-Day

your glaciers

draw over me

blankets of moss

chill my bones

and longingly

I return to grass

a blade

green

sharp

you

don’t cut me

your shadow does

 

I

grow

spread roots

below

brown soil

the smell of heme

rain drizzles…

your claws

draw over me

a glass roof

your silence

swollen

I grow

become moss

slick

damp

pristine

I wait…

for the procession of tarantulas

weighing down on my head

I morph into a centipede

small

repulsive

weightless

your beard scratches me

resonant timbre

riding the air

like a wave

transversal

sourceless

limitless

clash of metals

in musty tunnels of

darting eyes

darting eyes

darting eyes

 

 

Fetus 

Mind

Let me go

Your jagged lines prick

At dawn a sun of fruit awaits

Babies smile sweetly

 

Untie me

Your cords reek

Cannabis flower

Locks of god

Cascade

Cascade

Mind, leave me as I am

Crouched in my mother’s womb

Asleep

Leave me be

Crystals shower over her black tresses

As she ponders what name to give me

When I come to you

In

Ev

It

Ab

Ly

 

 

Dear Autumn…

My dear one has killed himself

It was sadness he said he was after, sadness

The shriek that issued from a profound longing to fly

Bewildered the wrung-out sky of the city

And now my dreams are flooded with fleeing crows

My recollections riddled with the slayings of people larger than life

For the world seems narrow and shrunken to me

Beauty beyond the looking glass

Under a wizard’s spell

 

I felt it like the everlasting fall of stars

His love splattering on the pavement

Like the spread of the plague

The melody of his welcome reception into the heavens

“Everything is music,” he used to tell me

Now I listen to his song of sorrows every day

As it roams like a troubled spirit through photographs on the wall

And falls

From the skyscrapers of my blood-curdling thoughts

Like a leaf

Mundus inversus

Minj t’pangopun gishtat m’i brejnë si drunin

Fëmijë paganë përplasin duart për

Lëkura delesh tupanë-

Tamthat e mi pulsojnë vdekjen

E nji dielli

Po lind së prapthi e detnat po mbyten

N’qiell

Mbijnë jargovanët që ushqejnë bletët e çelikta-

Bekojnë burrat shtatzanë qe lindin macet e zeza-

Ua prejnë rrugën atyne që ecin me duar

E...

Llumi i kambëve u âsht djersë balli

Që pagëzon zotin n’shtëpi njeriu

 

 

Amuletë 

Balerina melankolike të vallezojnë mbi kry

E korbat t’flenë randë peshue në flokë A...

S’të merr gjumë nate po andrrat ta shpojnë barkun

E kandrat ta kanë mbulue fytyrën me krahë xhami e ti A

Ti rri i trishtuem prej dekës së trupit tand

Por A....mos..

Na t’çmendunit nuk vdesim nën hije

Pa e përbi diellin e me hukatë akull në ajër

Pa i hyp trenit e me ik n’do tinguj manie

Që t’pagezojnë në emën t’atit, t’birit e t’shpirtit t’sëmurë

E t’pangopun prej bukurisë fluoreshente

Që s’mundesh m’e ledhatue e m’e mbajt n’gji

As me ia ndi parfumin as me ia puth qepallat

Veç me e shiku prej s’largu e me u trishtu prej lumnie

Që je i vogel i vogel lundrue n’vajna t’paskajshme ullini

 

Qiell reshon mbi gjoksin tand A

E ti një pllakë mermeri e shtrime në nji rrugë pa emën

I peshon n’shpinë rrotat e baltosuna e kambët e gjakosuna

Dhe je ende dhe je dhe je

E nji flutur krahpupul të thyen copë cope

Dhe nuk je më nuk je

Por A...

Na t’çmendunit nuk vdesim nën hije

Bota vdes solemnisht për ne

Mos u trishto...A

 

Me dashuni

E.H.

 

 

Lucid Dream 

Ajo ishte veç nji fëmijë

Në shpinë i vizatuen stemë nji shtëpi

Me dritare të hapuna e oxhak

Përmbi që tymoste vitet mbi kryet e saj

 

Breshka po ecë...

Breshka po ecë...

 

Syjeshilët e ngrirë n’fotografi zbehen

Zbehje portretesh shumohen nëpër mure gri

Mite humbjesh n’njërëz shëmbëllyem

Shenjtnue n’ikona muresh vëzhgojnë të gjallët

Të gjallët rrjedhin

Të gjallët rrjedhin

Të gjallët n’asfalt gozhda mbjellin

Fotografite

N’mure

Gozhdue

 

Breshka po ecë

Breshka po ecë

 

Dikush me temjan ka hy n’shtëpinë e vizatueme

Dritat ka ndezë dhe dru mbi zjarr ka hedhë

marshi ka nisë

kupat janë mbushë

edhe nji po vjen

edhe plot mbas saj

“festa e humbjes së madhe”

 

Breshka po ecë

Breshka po ecë

 

Tonshem shpina i âsht randu

Qytetit âsht nisë drejt gozhdambjellësve

Fluturueshëm

Mos mbjellni ma gozhda me i lutë

“Syjeshilet i kam gjetë

Janë në shtepinë time

Festueshëm”

 

Breshka po ecë

Breshka po ecë

 

Hapat e randë qytetin e errësuen

 

Ajo pa veten e ngrirë në portretin e ikonuem

Gozhdambjellësi nguliti nji gozhdë humbjen me ia përforcue

Deri nesër

 

Breshka po ecë

Breshka po ecë

 

Bën ngrohtë rreth zjarrit në këtë shtëpi

I tha syjeshilja

Merre kukullën tande e luej me mu

 

 

Mosdita

më mbulojnë

akullnajat e tua

batanije lëmashku

m’i ngrijnë eshtnat

e përmallshëm

kthehem në bar

fije

e gjelbër

e mprehtë

ti

s’më këputë

veç hija jote

unë

rritem

la rranjët

poshtë

dhè i kafenjtë

erë heme

pikon shi...

më mbulojnë

thonjtë e tu

çati e qelqtë

heshtja jote

e anjtun

rritem

myshk

i rrëshqitshëm

 

i lagësht

i pashkelun

pres ...

litarë tarantulash

rëndojnë kryet

bahem shumëkambësh

i vogël

i shëmtuem

i papeshë

më gërvisht

mjekër e jotja

timbër

kumbues

mbi erë

valë

transfersale

pa burim

pa cak

kërcitje metalesh

në tunele t’pa ajrosuna

shikimesh

shikimesh

shikimesh

 

 

Fetus 

Lëshom

Mendje

Vijat e tua thepisun shpojnë

Diell pembe m’pret n’ag

Bebet buzëqeshin sheqershëm

 

Më zgjidh

Litarët e tu kutërbojnë

Lulkanabisi

Flokët e zotit

Rrjedhin

Rrjedhin

Mendje lermë

Në mitrën e nanës unë kruspullitun

Fle

Lermë

Kristalet bien mbi flokun e saj të zi

Ajo mendon çfarë emni ka me m’vu

Kur unë të vij te ti

Pa

Shm

Ang

Shëm

 

 

E dashtun vjeshtë...

Njeriu im e ka mbytë veten

Trishtimin tha ta mbys, trishtimin

Klithmë e mallit të tij për fluturimin

Ka shashtrisë qiellin e shtrydhun t’qytetit

E më âsht mbushë gjumi sorra n’arrati

Më janë mbushë kujtimet mbytje njerëzish të mëdhenj

Se bota e ngushtë, e tkurrun m’duket

Bukuri tej thjerrave nën hipnozë magjistarësh

 

E kam ndje si ramje të përjetshme yjesh

Përplasjen e dashunisë së tij në asfalt

Si perhapje murtaje

Melodinë e pritjes së tij në ajër

“Gjithçka është muzikë” me thoshte

Tash unë çdo ditë e degjoj kangën e trishtimit të tij

Që endet shpirt trazuem nëpër fotografi muri

E bie

Nga rrokaqiejt e mendimeve të mia rrëqethëse

Si gjeth

Translator's Note

Ervina Halili’s Amulet is an experimental collection of poems that comes to grips with the aftershocks of personal and collective traumas, roving through the dark terrain of the human subconscious, a kind of bewildering parallel universe. Through spare, hermetic and elliptical verse, Halili presents a liminal and tangled supernatural world built of kaleidoscopic fragments and poignant recollections. Along the way, there are encounters with the grand and celestial, the earthly and quotidian, seasons, days and their antithesis (“not-days”), birth and death, madness, and beauty.

My priority in translating this surrealist work has been to recreate the vividness of the images even as I remain as faithful as possible to the rhythm and cadence of the original; in short, to strike a balance between its visual and sonic strength, which tends to work hand in hand. Amulet was written in the rich Gheg dialect, which endows it with another layer of depth in terms of diction and syntactical structure. It is also, however, an implicit challenge to the established linguistic form, the southern Tosk dialect, which serves as the basis of standard Albanian. Folk idioms, mythic elements, colloquialisms and neologisms abound—there are inversions and ellipses, and conjunctions, articles, and particles are often omitted.

Halili addresses the dislocation of the Yugoslav Wars of the 1990s obliquely in “Lucid Dream.” In it, a little girl, herself among the green-eyed people in the photographs described in the poem, comes to us from the posters of missing persons on the walls of government buildings in Kosovo’s capital Prishtina, faded beyond recognition from precipitation and the passage of time. At once grim, playful, and solemn, the poem recounts one of the darkest episodes in the country’s history and depicts the living communing with the missing and the dead. The original, especially the following passage, reads like a dark nursery rhyme:

 

Të gjallët rrjedhin

Të gjallët rrjedhin

Të gjallët n’asfalt gozhda mbjellin

Fotografite

N’mure

Gozhdue

 

In my translation, I sought to preserve the simplicity of the register as well as the rhyme. In order to approximate a similar aural effect, I inverted lines that appear identical in the original.

 

The living go in droves

In droves go the living

Planting nails in asphalt

To nail photographs

To walls

 

At the same time, the inversion replicates a common element in Halili’s work, an austerity often expressed through clipped verses.


Suzana Vuljevic

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