DEBELJAK, Aleš Aleš Debeljak holds a Ph.D. in Social Thought from Syracuse University, New York. He is currently chair of the cultural studies department at the University of Ljubljana, Slovenia. A poet, cultural critic and translator, he has won several awards, including the Prešeren Fund Prize (the highest literary award in Slovenia) and the Miriam Lindberg Israel Poetry for Peace Prize (Tel Aviv). His books have appeared in Croatian, Czech, German, English, Polish, Hungarian, Italian and Japanese translations. His recent publications in English include Reluctant Modernity, Tivilight ofthe Idols: Recollections ofa Lost Yugoslavia, and books of poems: Anxious Moments, The City and the Child, Dictionary ofSilence. Aleš Debeljak, pesnik, kulturni kritik in prevajalec, je predstojnik oddelka za kulturologijo na Fakulteti za družbene vede v Ljubljani. Doktoriral je na Svracuse University v New Yorku. Prejel je številne nagrade, med njimi nagrado Prešernovega sklada za poezijo in Miriam Lindberg Poetry for Peace Prize v Tel Avivu. Njegove knjige so izšle v hrvaščini, češčini, nemščini, angleščini, poljščini, madžarščini, italijanščini in japonščini. Njegove najbolj znane pesniške zbirke so Mesto in otrok, Slovar tišine in Nedokončane hvalnice. S svojo ameriško ženo in tremi otroki živi v Ljubljani. Sodobnost 2001 I 96 ALEŠ DEBEUAK Bosnian EIegy for Miljenko Jergovic Sarajevo-Zagreb Sing, young poet, touch my burning skin, darkened by long treks through the wild hills to the ends of the world. Don't give up now, when the gunners' fevered sights are trained on the stained facades of museums and palaces. They cower silently, like spent reliquaries. Just list what remains: flocks of swallows twittering under former arches and campaniles, the eternal wisdom of the French novel we read in the bomb shelter, the silvery down which disappears from a baby's earlobes, thunder from the Pannonian plains. The smeli of gunpovvder irritates the lungs. We haven't yet crossed the line. Speak now: the surface of the pool ripples. I don't know if it will be blessed. Rings glow in the depths. What remains unknovvn / rejoices. Believe me: I'm ready, sing to me for the last tirne of the gentle love of storms, of the mysteries of a woman's shadow and a marble staircase. Sing, as you sang before your hair turned gray! Sodobnost 2001 I 97 Aleš Debeljak The City and the Child No cry, really, is meaningless. Only when an archangel appears, like a blue gentian on a mountain slope, do we know, if only for an instant, our native land. Your Babvlonian moan will not die away. Thatfs why poets never sleep. The task seems clear now: this will be a chronicle of pain. The size of a melting glacier. Which floods poppy fields and villages, targets painted on the portaFs slender frieze, the lush filigree of Turkish silver: each tear deepens you. You stand on the immovable ročk. The word around you crumbles into the abyss. You drink the water of hfe, drawn from the mouths of those who breathe with you. Each morning they come to witness your rebirth. Like this poem. It won't be long before it will be silenced by an avalanche. But a thousand echoes will spring up in its plače. For the love flowing through your veins is the seed, the blossom, and the fruit. Migrations You see everything, evervthing: the breath of flies, a teapot whistling, a cartridge recklessly shot off at daybreak, a pattern on the wallpaper, the gloom of a concert hali, dusty violins left in haste on the floor, an inscription in the language of the two prophets who came to the Slavs, things drowning in infinite light, a scream tearing suddenly across the sky, gleaming metal, a column of children and women carrving newborn babies, the scent of basil in a garden, a trickle of plum juice oozing into the rutted tracks left by retreating armies. Evervthing. You see graveyards. And metastases of white-hot pyres. Here the world we know lets out its final gasp. The ancient order of violence is returning to the hearths. The magic of words is dying out. And a girls' choir stands in silence. A trail points east, across a snowy pass. Nothing erases it. Now you know the beli tolls for you and for us. Sodobnost 2001 I 98 Aleš Debeljak Cosmopolis For Josip Osti Sarajevo-Ljubljana Listen well: is that the trumpetfs call? The cavalry rides trough history. The shadow of an ancient battle wants to be the truth again. A distant stairway winds toward a cloud. Mountains fall, a chalice trembles. Emptiness spills over the edge. Yet you, miraculously, grow faster than you can be destroyed. A titmouse will not leave its nest. The west wind tempts you with redemption in a hollowed loaf of bread at the Last Supper. A broken toy. More children are missing. Yet you endure. You interrupt the world's monologue, its endless drone. You're the flickering snow on the screen, which is always on. The vault of the universe above you is crystal clear. The rest of us stare helplessb/ into the cold prison of the starš. We watch a finger rise from the flame flickering behind your back, which never consumes you. And on the arch of the sky the finger writes, tirelessly, "I am." Mercenaries The wind has died down in the vineyards on the hills. A moth flaps against a carbon lamp. Evening draws a feeble breath. A prayer, unheeded, disappears in the twilight. God remains indifferent. From a distance we watch the heirs to a mighty throne tremble at the decrees. Dynasties i endlessly rise and fall. North and south, east and west: we serve you faithfully. The triumphal arch pierces the clouds. It's not mulberry juice that sticks to our palms. We grip our shields. In a dismembered country a tangled vine grows in neglect. We can only guess at its suffering. Langobards, Scythians, masters of Norik: in the name of another's victory we opened treasuries and skulls, leaving behind us empty caverns. Now we rest. Our work is done. It will not be easy to begin again. Our sight, too, has given out. Ali we can see is the simple order of things. Not much, less than nothing. We don't even recognize the face in the puddle when at times it reflects our own image. Sodobnost 2001 I 99 Aleš Debeljak Weather Forecast A spring shower rushes over the sunken monarchy. Will it ever end? The rhythm striking the window lulls me into a deep coma. I hand myself over to silence and flow into damp soil so that in a year or two I can live in a cloud: my true sanctuary. A faithful horse takes a Cossack towards town. Perhaps the rider doesn't know it yet: his death, like ali languages erased from the earth, will be laid at invisible feet. Even greater adventurers await the end of the natural cycle. But it's not up to me to judge. I can only rain on the crying child in diapers, on carts and burnt skyscrapers, on the tobacco smuggling route. I rain: I don't ask where the windows in black have gone. I cover evervthing, like a transparent varnish. I rain. On a balance in the market, on coffins used for shelter. I rain down on the spine of the boy who will stand before a line of sturdy soldiers and give an order: and the line will shudder. Faces in Front of the Wall Humble is the charity of early mornings. Everything that happens then must happen: to you, to me, to the whole world. Temptation is great indeed: we gaze, enchanted, as a fire's eternal glow melts the columns of cathedrals, a virgin's slumber, and the hidden spring of a toy. We watch, motionless, as in a tranquil family crypt. Each of us, I think, is already doomed. We are silent. What else could we do? Like a stunned witness in a country when it was stili a country. It lives on, esdled into an image which won't let us sleep. Day and night quiver in our pupils. Do we kneel, hoping the storm will take pity on us and bring a mother's gentle forgiveness? That it will blur the line between the altar and the offering? I guess, I know: there is no greater mistake. Embers cover the fire screen. Even the blood spilling down a girTs hip has lost its taste. It doesn't smeli like plowed soil crumbling in our fingers. In vain we try: we're less than a footnote. Translated by Christopher Merrill and the author Sodobnost 2001 I 100 ALEŠ DEBEUAK Bosanska elegija Miljenku Jergoviču, Sarajevo-Zagreb Poj, mladi pesnik, dotakni se mi vnete kože, ožgane od dolgih begov čez obzorja, skoz gričevnata brezpotja, ne odnehaj zdaj, ko vročična zrkla topničarjev strmijo v razpoke na štukaturi muzejev in palač, ki nemo zdijo. Kakor izrabljene svetinje. Naštej preprosto, kar je še ostalo: jate lastovic, ki ščebetajo pod bivšimi zvoniki in oboki, večna modrost francoskega romana, ki beremo ga v zakloniščih, srebrnikast puh na ušesnih mečicah dojenčkov, ki naglo že odpada, zamolkli grom z ravnic Panonije. Duh smodnika draži pljuča ljudi. Mi nismo stopili čez črto v pesku. Spregovori zdaj: gladina tolmuna valovi. Ne vem, če bo blagoslovljena. V mulju žarijo prstani. Radostijo se neznane / stvari. Verjemi, res: pripravljena sem. Zadnjič mi zapoj še o ljubezni mili do neviht, o skrivnosti ženskih senc in marmornih stopnišč, poj, kakor si pel, ko še nisi osivel. Sodobnost 2001 I 101 Aleš Debeljak Mesto in otrok Noben stok, zares, ni brez namena. Le kadar arhangel se nam prikaže kot v planini modri svišč, za bežen hip morda spoznamo, kje stoji izbrana domovina. Ne bo zamrl tvoj babilonski vršič. Zato ne spijo pesniki. Naloga zdaj se jasna zdi: to bo kronika in v njej bolečina. Velika kot gruda ledenika, ki se topi. In preplavi nasade maka in vasi, tarče v frizu vitkega portala in razkošne gube turškega srebra: vsaka solza te poglobi. Stojiš na skali, ki se ne premakne. Okrog tebe svet se kruši v prepad. Ti piješ živo vodo. Črpaš jo iz ust ljudi, ki s tabo dihajo. Zraven so kot dokaz, ko se zjutraj spet rodiš. Kot tale pesem. Še malo in utišal jo bo plaz. A tisoči odmevov se namesto nje pognalo bo v zrak. Ker ljubezen, ki teče ti skozi žile, je seme, svet in sad. Selitve Vse vidiš, vse: dihanje muh, piskajoči čajnik, naboj, brezskrbno izstreljen v svit, motiv tapete, polmrak koncertne dvorane, prašne violine, v naglici puščene na parketu, napis v jeziku dveh prerokov, ki k Slovanom sta prišla, stvari, ki se utapljajo v neizmeri luči, krik, ki šine v sekundi do neba, blesk kovine, kolono mladoletnikov in žensk, ki nosijo novorojence, baziliko, kako diši v gredici, tenke curke slivovega soka, ki pronica v razpokano zemljo, zgaženo od umikajočih se armad. Vse. Vidiš pokopališča. In metastaze razbeljenih grmad. Tu bo izhropel znani svet. Davni red nasilja se vrača na ognjišča. Ugaša magija besed. In nem stoji dekliški zbor. Proti vzhodu vodi sled, čez zasnežen prelaz. Ne izbriše je noben napor. Zdaj veš, da bije stolpna ura za vas in nas. Sodobnost 2001 I 102 Aleš Debeljak Kozmopolis za Josipa Ostija, Sarajevo-Ljubljana Prisluhni dobro: je to trobente tenki spev? Konjenica jezdi skoz minule dni. Senca davnega spopada hoče enkrat še resnica biti. Daleč je stopnišče, ki se vije do oblaka. Sestopajo gorovja in kelih drgeta. Čez rob se zliva mu praznina. A ti, tako čudežno, rasteš hitreje, kot te uničujejo. Sinica noče zapustiti gnezda. Zahodni veter te vabi v odršitev, izdolbeno v kruh na mizi zadnjega kosila. Počena vrtavka. Vedno več je že pogrešanih otrok. A ti vztrajaš. Svetu segaš v besedo, v neskončni monolog. Migetavi sneg si na ekranu, ki večno je prižgan. Svod vesolja nad teboj je kristalno jasen. Vsi drugi smo, ki nemočno zremo v temnico mrzlih zvezd. Gledamo, kako se iz plamena, ki ti nad hrbtom trepeta, a te nikoli ne použije, dviga prst. In piše, piše neutrudno svoj »sem« na obok neba. Najemniški vojaki Umiril se je veter v goricah. Vešča buta ob karbidovko. Večer slabotno diha. Prošnja, neuslišana, v somrak izgine ob brezbrižnosti boga. Mi od daleč gledamo, kako se od pravil in nujnosti tresejo nasledniki mogočnega prestola. 9 Tudi dinastije menjajo se v nedogled. Jug in sever, vzhod, zahod: zvesto služimo. Slavolok prebodel je oblake. Ni sok murve, kar lepi nam dlani. Ščite tesno stiskamo. V razkosani deželi trta čaka neobrezana. Samo ugibamo, kako ji je hudo. Langobardi, Skiti in vladarji Norika: v imenu tuje zmage smo odpirali zaklade in lobanje. Za nami so ostale prazne jame. Zdaj počivamo. Končana je naloga. Začeti znova je težko. Tudi vid nas pušča na cedilu. Kar sploh lahko ugledamo, je enostavni red predmetov. A to je malo, manj kot nič. Še obrazov ne spoznamo, ko včasih luža nam nakloni lastni lik. Sodobnost 2001 I 103 Aleš Debeljak Meteorološka slika Pomladna ploha vrši čez potopljeno monarhijo. Se bo sploh končala? Ritem, ki ob šipe tolče, ziblje me v globoko komo. Izročam se tihoti in odtekam v vlažno prst, da čez leto, morda dve, naselim notranjost oblaka, ki je moj pravi hram. Proti mestu nosi zvesti konj kozaka. Najbrž še ne ve: njegova smrt, nič drugače kot izkoreninjeni jeziki, res bo položena k nevidnim nogam. Ko naravni ciklus se zaključi, to še večje pustolovce čaka. A ni moje, da bi sodil. Jaz morem le kapljati na jokajoče dete v plenicah, na vozove in ožgane stolpnice, na tihotapsko pot tobaka. Kapljam: ne sprašujem, kam so vdove v črnem šle. Vse prekrivam, kot prozorni film laka. Kapljam. Na precizne tehtnice, na krste, ki za zaklon služijo. Kapljam po hrbtenici dečka, pred katerim, ko nekoč bo prednje stopil in dal ukaz, vzdrhtele bojo strumne vrste. Sodobnost 2001 I 104 Aleš Debeljak Obrazi pred zidom Skromna je miloščina zgodnjih juter. V njih zgodi se vse, kar se zgoditi mora: zate, zame, za ves svet. Skušnjava je res velika: očarano strmimo, ko neskončni sij požara taja stebre katedral, deviški sen in skrivno vzmet igrače. Negibno zremo, kakor v spokojni rodbinski kripti. Vsak od nas je, mislim, že preklet. Tiho smo, kaj bi drugega. Kot osupla priča v deželi, dokler je še bila. Zdaj naprej živi, izgnana v podobo, ki ne pusti nam spati. Ki dan in noč v zenicah nam trepeta. Mar klečimo v upanju, da se neurje nas usmili in prinese odpuščanje, kakor blaga mati? Da zabriše mejo, ki loči dar od žrtvenika? Ugibam, vem: ni večje zmote. Ogorki so zasuli že okvir ekrana. Še kri, ki po dekliškem boku je spolzela, izgubila je okus. Na diši kot zemlja preorana, ki pod prsti se drobi. Trudimo se, a ne gre: manj smo od fusnote. * Sodobnost 2001 I 105