GORANOVIĆ, Pavle
Pavle Goranović, born in 1971 in Nikšic, Montenegro, graduated from the Faculty of Philosophv. He writes poetry, prose and essavs. He has published two books, Ornaments of the Night and Reading the Silence. His poems have been translated into several languages. Secretarv of the Independent Association of Montenegrin Writers. He is also on the editorial board of the renovvned journal for literature, cnlture and social questions, ARS. He devotes much of his time to literary criticism and the problems of contemporarv aesthetic theories.
Pavle Goranović, roden 1971. godine u Nikšicu, Črna gora, diplomirao je na Filozofskom fakulteta, odsjek za fuozofiju. Piše prozu, poeziju i esejistiku. Objavio dvije knjige: Orna-mentika noči i Citanje tišine. Pjesme su mu prevedene na nekoliko svetskih jezika. Sekretar Crnogorskog društva nezavisnih književnika. Član redakcije uglednog časopisa za književnost, kulturu i društvena pitanja ARS. Posebno se bavi književnom kritikom i prob-lemima savremenih estetičkih teorija.
Sodobnost 2001 I 144
PAVLE GORANOVIĆ
Sabato's Photograph
On my table - shapes ofletters, a few quotations
and a recent photograph of Ernesto Sabato.
There he is, smiling and with a raised eyebrow
walking towards the lense. (Even so, we don't
see each other.) Then, notes for a short essay
about a new edition of Tunnel, written for the next
issue of our weekly. While watching
the elderly face and unrealised eyes, I actually
think of the one and only reader. More or less the same people
are going to read the prose Fm talking about,
and my poem, which I'm writing right now.
The same people, this one man, have read this
somewhere else at least once - in some other form,
signed by others, and - which happens most often -
with a different order of words, if not already
similar to this. The same people have, in different places,
found the meanmg, or failed to notice it - in essays,
poems, in evervthing thatfs ever been written. Even so,
I go on writing; like this, I may sometimes surpass reality. I also set sail towards this sin, my good Juan Pablo!
Sodobnost 2001 I 145
Pavle   Goranović
A Dizzy Speli of Soren Kierkegaard
i
I was born of those who have the courage
to come to terms with their own ignorance.
A man of virtues and too many
obvious faults, Fm an unfinished cosmos.
I, Victor Eremita, dare think that in tirne
I will be called when skills are discussed.
I preach. I claim Fm revealing nothing new,
but they watch me with disbelief.
I teli them that epochs are finished,
that evervthing has been named a long tirne ago.
Stili, they reproach me with some sort of originalitv.
In my really worthless thinking, I merely
copy forms, dealing in
apparent understanding. Ali I can do
is wait for a movement that will pass judgement.
VI
I know of the sound of carriages in summer evenings.
And I know the meaning of their movement. Man's
destiny and sin I also know. This is the legacy
I have been left, which denies my species
the privilege of a new beginning, new way. Ib some documents
- perhaps unjustly -1 attribute meaning.
I think of unwritten poems, of what has not been created.
And so, from the atmosphere, I gather doleful lyrical gleanings:
I am a poet who doesn't write verse!
I also know of the serenity of Socrates,
and I know that I shall never manifest it myself.
Our languages are too small to enable us to self-realise,
and yet some of us dare ascribe to the world
our personal trifles. I, too, keep a diary about marginal things,
paradox prepares me for life.
Too little or too much - it's not up to me to judge.
Mosty I have written about homeland and woman -
look on that as my only legacy.
P.S. It is high tirne for us to grow older in order to understand Greek, and understand it in a way the Greeks themselves ivould have understood it if they had Christian suppositions
Sodobnost 2001 I 146
Pavle   Goranović
Regina Olsen
A man never suffers from spiritual vertigo when he thinks of only one thing -and I think only ofyou - nor ofphysical vertigo when he ftxes his eyes on only one object, and ali I look at is you ...
K Konstantinus
I entrusted mvself to you, on nights like this one,
never having an explanation. And this parting,
(which tears you apart, I see) is as though it were happening
to someone else. I don't realh/ know why you've been left.
For months I have guarded your image,
like some kind of memory of life. But now, when I should be
beyond my senses, I know that my thoughts
have mastered your gentle being. I don't understand
your sorrow. You don't understand my intention -
evervthing else is a played-out love. You have remained a living statue,
which from behind the garden gate slowly changes idleness
to death. And I, I am the knight of perfect flight,
whose painful reason won't allow him to love.
And here the kingdom crumbles. My rather wretched kingdom!
Lost manuscripts
I don't deny it: I write untruthful,
deceitful lines. The method
is the same from text to text.
However, here and there it's possible to find
a line or two with a worrying degree of truth.
Not long ago, looking for completely different
texts, I found among rare
manuscripts the following words:
The most important cities are those
already buried - new ones are not
worth founding. The best languages
have died out - there is no point in inventing better ones.
The most respected schools were situated
in gardens now abandoned.
The most interesting manuscripts are lost ...
It is worth discovering, them. For us,
surviving members of the Babylonian library.
Sodobnost 2001 I 147
Pavle   Goranović
Great Preparations
Unquestionable are the holes in the ozone layer.
Tomorow's day, too, is, to a good extent, unquestionable.
The printing of this poem, weekly results
of matches of the Primera division, a handful of small
and large events - the/re for sure unquestionable. At least as much
as the smeli of coffee and the colour of my jacket.
Profane things possess a special certaintv,
the kind we usually don't pay attention to.
Here I have always especially respected a number
of side-certainties. It is unquestionable that little George
had skillfulh/ grappled with English.
Rotation of the Earth is, probablv, unquestionable.
And then, many plače names, our names
and driving along dusty roads. We need to talk
only of unquestionable things. Things not praised
by poets. Fear of happiness is certain,
death - most certain. Loneh/ people know this
- at receptions, in cold hotel rooms
and automobiles. Contemporaries of Martin Heidegger.
Translated by Evald Flisar
Sodobnost 2001 I 148
PAVLE GORANOVIĆ
Sabatova fotografija
Na mom stolu - forme pisma, par citata
i skorašnja fotografija Ernesta Sabata.
Eno ga gdje, nasmijan i sa podignutom obrvom,
korača prema objektivu. (Ipak, jedan drugog
ne vidimo.) Onda, bilješke za kratak esej
o novom izdanju Tunela, spreman za naredni
broj ovdašnjeg nedjeljnika. Dok gledam
staračko lice i neostvarene oči, ustvari, razmišljam
o jednom jedinom čitaocu. Bezmalo isti ljudi
pročitače tu prozu o kojoj Vam govorim
i moje stihove što, u ovom času, nastaju.
Isti ljudi, taj jedan čovjek, tu su več negdje
makar jednom pročitali - u nekim drugim oblicima,
sa drugim potpisima, i - što je najčešče -
sa izmijenjenim rasporedom riječi, ili več
nešto slično toma. Isti ljudi su, na različitim mjestima,
pronašli značenje, ili ga nijesu uočili - u esejima,
pjesmama, svemu što je nekoč napisano. Ipak, pišem;
desi se da tako nadmašim stvarnost. Otisnem se i
ka tom grijehu, dobri moj Huan Pablo!
Sodobnost 2001 I 149
Pavle   Goranović
Vrtoglavica Serena Kjerkegora
Od roda sam onih koji imaše hrabrosti
da se pomire sa sopstvenim neznanjem.
Čovjek sam sa vrlinom i sa odveč
uočljivim manama, jedan nedovršeni kosmos.
Ja, Victor Eremita, usudujem se da na čas
budem pozvan kada se razmatra o vještinama.
Propovijedam. Tvrdim da ne otkrivam nista novo,
pa opet, gledaju me sa nevjericom.
Govorim da su epohe okončane,
da su sva imenovanja odavno iskoriščena,
Uzalud, prebacuju mi nekakvu izvornost.
U svom odista ništavnom mišljenju, ja tek
preslikavam oblike, bavim se
tobožnjim razumijevanjem. Mogu samo
da čekam na pokret koji če presuditi.
VI
Znam za zvuk kočija u ljetne predvečerje.
I smisao njihovog kretanja znam. Čovjekov
usud i grijeh, takode poznajem. To je več
ono što mi je ostavljeno, sto mom rodu uskračuje
privilegiju početka i novog puta. Nekim hartijama
- možda nepravdeno - dodjeljujem značaj.
Mislim na nenapisane pjesme, na ono što je neostvareno.
Iz atmosfere, dakle, skupljam tužne lirske pabirke:
ja sam pjesnik koji ne piše stihove!
Još znam i za smirenost Sokratovu,
pa i to da je nikada neču ispoljiti.
Suviše su mali naši jezici da bismo sebe ispunili,
a ipak neki od nas se usude da svijetu pripisu
svoje tričave stvari. I sam vodim dnevnike o marginalijama,
paradoks me priprema za život.
Premalo ili odviše - nijesam pozvan da ocijenim.
Uglavnom, pisao sam o zemlji, o ženi -
smatrajte to mojom jedinom zaostavštinom.
P. S. Krajnje je vrijeme da se postaramo da razumijemo grčki, i to da ga razumijemo onako kako bi ga razumjeli sami Grči kad bi imali hrišcanske pretpostavke.
Sodobnost 2001 I 150
Pavle   Goranović
Regina Olsen
Čovjek nikada ne pati od duhovne vrtoglavice kada misli samo na jedno, aja mislim samo na tebe - ni od tjelesne vrtoglavice, ako prikuje oči samo najedanpredmet, aja samo tebeposmatram ...
K. Konstaninus
Povjeravao sam ti se, u nočima poput ove,
nikada imajuci objašnjenje. I ovaj razlaz,
(koji te razdire, vidim) kao da se nekom drugom
dešava. Sto si ostavljena, ja, zapravo, i ne znam.
Tek, mjesecima sam tvoju pojavu čuvao,
kao neko sječanje na život. A sada kad bi trebalo
da sam izvan svojih cula, znam da su moje misli
savladale tvoje nježno biče. Ja ne razumijem
tvoju tugu. Ti ne razumiješ moju namjeru -
sve ostalo je izigrana ljubav. Ti si ostala živa statua,
što iza baštenske kapije dokolicu polako pretvara
u smrt. Aja, ja sam vitez jednog savršenog bjekstva,
kome mučni razum ne dopusta da ljubi.
I tu se ruši kraljevstvo. Moje prilično bijedno kraljevstvo!
Izgubljeni rukopisi
Ne krijem: pišem neistinite, prevarantske redove. Postupak se ponavlja iz teksta u tekst. No, gdjegdje se može naiči i na stihove sa zabrinjavajučom mjerom istine. Nedavno sam, tražeči sasvim dru|e tekstove, medu rijetkim rukopisima, pronašao i sljedeče riječi: Najznačajniji gradovi su oni koji su več pokopani - ne vrijedi osnivati nove. Najbolji jezici su izumrli - ne vrijedi bolje osmišljavati. Najpoštovanije škole su se nalazile u sada več zapuštenim vrtovima. Najzanimljiviji rukopisi su izgubljeni ... Vrijedi ih otkriti. Nama, preživjelim članovima Vavilonske biblioteke.
Sodobnost 2001 I 151