Poem
Moikom Zeqo
Zodiac: 2
Fish, fish, fish:they’re my footsteps, measured and holy—
the prints of an aerial Gulliver—molecules
and, at the same time, the void.
Each arrival is a return. The bottom is also a beginning.
Fish are biological swords,
aquatic boomerangs.
What magical glue
joins the Milky Way
to a herd of horses,*
the moon
to a pod of dolphins,
an angel
to an insect?
Fish sow grain in the Illyrian necropolis,
then reap Beethoven’s symphonic face.
All the leaves glisten
with a fiery dew.
The caverns reach out to me with their sensory stalagmites.
My shadow drifts like an abstract balloon,
like a sun, across these concrete depths.
Saint George with an aqualung, I once killed
iconographic sharks, Byzantine dragons.
The Sahara is a map of the sea;
the sea offers only its frightening semblance.
Kristoforidhi’s glowworm**
is a circus snake charmer
inside a bottle tossed by the waves
—a discovered home that was never mine.
The muscled, invisible air is covered in wounds:
the scars of rainbows.
Pontius Pilate is washing his hands—
for him, hygiene is more important than Christ.
A mythical fish launches itself—a huge leap—
like the god Redon’s asthmatic sneeze.***
Durrës Bay is the skull
a watery Hamlet holds in his hand.
There’s no longer any doubt about death—
death is my measure of certainty.
Man is the house of the Creator;
outside Man, the Creator disappears.
I leap over a tide pool—
a drop of the devil’s sulfurous sweat.
The wind is a jargon spoken by the air,
which the illiterate stones understand absolutely.
The universe: a floating anthology
constructing an aesthetics of nostalgia
for the memoryless fish—skeptical and brutal.
From the waist up, I’m an albatross;
waist down, I’m fishlike.
The only human part I have left is my navel—
the genesis of the universe.
I play hide-and-seek
among the statues and gods,
appearing and disappearing
behind marble, where I dissolve away.
Inside the mouth of an angel
a tongue becomes a prophetfish—
Jeremiah with fishbones of bronze,
Isaiah with the moon for a tail,
Zachariah covered in scales.
Inside the opacity of dusk, even horses look like flowers,
and a cactus resembles an octopus.
Eternity perches on the backs of ephemeral butterflies,
on a drop of dew about to dry.
All around me: fish, fish, fish—
when they’re separated from each other
they’re even further divorced from God.
They lie below the surface—beneath the membranes of memory.
In Atlantis, they still build temples
and make statues from precious metals—
the people there write on papyrus
in the undersea air of water.
The hero Milosao sleeps in the shadows of fantastic turtles,§
and Hasan Zyko Kamberi sings in praise §§
of unimaginable treasures buried on distant islands.
Atlantis knows nothing of light-rail trains,
of computers and Tele-Bingo,
of TV and condoms. Down there,
they live among Crete’s bull-horned princes,
the bearded fish of Byzantine emperors,
Moby Dick—who is Shakespeare—,
the German poet Hans Magnus Enzensberger,
who, in a cabin of the sunken Titanic, lives and works
by the firelight of his pipe bowl—
its Migjenian inferno §§§
burns the very bones
of Christopher Columbus.
I’m alone here, empty, expressionless, on the edge of wordlessness.
Look over there! Romeofish and Julietfish—
destroyed, as we know, by the longings of love.
Me, too, I destroy myself
with the longings of history.
The future consoles me in vain,
just as utopias take their revenge on our disbelief,
endlessly working to tempt us with their mere ideas.
Even the dead are driven to despair
as they search for their second deaths.
I gather flowers that soon melt away in my hands;
the books I write turn invisible
as soon as I finish them.
Atheist fishermen act as though they’ve caught
that rare fish called Christ—
who carries in his belly the ring
of Spartacus, the insurgent.
I rest on an island of Self
surrounded by egocentric dusks
and the worry of loneliness.
So: a fish emerges from the water and onto the shore.
So: ten fish, sliding forward like bare feet.
So: a hundred fish flying in the sky like birds.
So: a thousand fish leaping ahead like gazelles
and rushing toward me—O what delight!
So: ten thousand fish planting roots around me like trees.
So: a hundred thousand fish
falling like drops against my face.
So: millions of fish, which I breathe like oxygen.
© Translation: 2015, Anastas Kapurani & Wayne Miller
From: Zodiac
Publisher: Zephyr, Brookline MA, 2015
*. This reference alludes to an ancient legend about the origin of the Milky Way, which says the galaxy is composed of straw and dust kicked up by a thundering herd of horses.
**. Kostandin Kristoforidhi (1827–95), important Albanian poet and linguist; the glowworm is a symbol in one of his most famous poems.
***. Redon is the name of the Illyrian god of water and the sea.
§. Milosao is the hero of Songs of Milosao, the main poetic work by Jeronim de Rada, (1814–1903), one of the most well-known Arbëresh lyric poets. The Arbëresh are the descendants of Albanians who resettled in southern Italy after the Ottoman invasion of Albania in the 14th century.
§§. Hasan Zyko Kamberi, born in the second half of the 18th century, is a prominent poet of the Muslim tradition in Albanian literature, though his masterwork, a 200-page collection of verse, has been lost.
§§§. Migjeni is the acronymic nom-de-plume of Millosh Gjergj Nikolla (1911–38), one of the most important fathers of modern Albania poetry. He died of tuberculosis at the age of 26.
From: Zodiac
Publisher: Zephyr, Brookline MA, 2015
Zodiak: 2
Zodiak: 2
Peshqit, peshqit, peshqit,janë hapat e mia të përkora dhe të shenjta
për udhëtimet e Guliverit në ajër, molekula dhe në
boshësi
Çdo mbritje është rikthim. Çdo funs është dhe fillim.
Peshqit janë shpata biologjike,
bumerangë të zooujërave.
Ç’ngjitës magjik
bashkon Kashtën e Kumtrit
me tufën e kuajve.
Hënën
me delfinët blu,
ëngjëllin
me insektin?
Peshqit mbjellin drithe mbi nekropolet ilire
dhe korrin fytyrën simfonike të Bethovenit.
Gjethet lagen
me vesë zjarri.
Shpellat më prekin me stalakmitet e shqisave.
Hija ime ikën si një balonë abstrakte
në Diellin e thellësive konkrete.
Shën Gjergj me akualang unë vrava dikur
peshkaqenë ikonografikë dragojsh bizantinë.
Sahara është harta e një deti
dhe deti është veç asimetri e frikshme.
Xixëllonja e Kristoforidhit
është zbutëse cirku për gjarpërinjtë
brenda një shisheje hedhur nga valët
gjej një shtëpi që kurrë nuk e pata.
Muskujt e padukshëm të ajrit janë plot plagë
dhe operacione kirurgjikale ylberesh.
Pilati lan duart
se higjenën e quan më të rëndësishme se sa Krishtin.
Një peshkth mitik hidhet, kërcen lart
si lemza azmatike e hyut Redon.
Gjiri i Durrësit është kafka
në gishtërinjtë e detit Hamlet,
s’ka dyshim më për vdekjen,
vdekja është dija e mosdyshimit.
Njeriu është banesa e Krijuesit,
jashtë njeriut Krijuesi zhduket.
Kapërcej një pellg –
pikë djerse sulfurike e Satanait,
Erërat janë një zhargon i ajrit,
po gurët analfabetë e dinë.
Gjithësia-antologji fluturuese
u shpik estetikat e nostalgjisë
peshqëve skeptikë, brutalë, pa kujtesë.
Nga mesi e sipër jam albatros,
nga mesi e poshtë jam peshk,
vetëm kërthizën kam prej njeriu-
gjeneza e universeve.
Mes statujash dhe hyjnish
kukamçefti luaj,
dukem dhe humbas,
mermerizohem dhe tretem.
Në gojën e engjëllit
gjuha është peshku profet –
Jeremia me haleza bronzi,
Isaia me bisht Hëne
Zaharia me luspa.
Mbas muzgut opak dhe kali duket si lule
dhe kaktusi si oktapod.
Përjetësia kalëron një flutur efemere
a një pikë vese që thahet
Peshqit, peshqit, peshqit,
kur janë të ndarë
janë më shumë se sa një divorc me Zotin,
ku janë thellësirat me membrana të holla kujtese,
Atlantida, ku ende ngrihen tempuj,
bëhen statuja prej metalit të çmuar orihallk,
njerëzit shkruajnë pergamena,
nën det mes një ajri uji?
Heroi Milosao fle nën hijen e breshkave përralltare
e Hasan Zyko Kamberi këndon
për thesaret përrallore në ishuj.
Atlantida nuk i njeh trenat elektrikë,
kompjuterat dhe telebingot
Tv-të dhe prezervativat.
Aty janë me princërit me brirë demi të Kretës
dhe perandorët bizantinë që janë peshq me mjekërr
dhe balena Mobi Dik që është Shekspiri
dhe poeti gjerman Hans Magnus Enzerberger, që jeton dhe punon në një kabinë
të “Titanikut” të mbytur
i ndriçuar në tërë vetëm nga zjarri i llullës
ku digjet një ferr migjenian
dhe vetë eshtrat
e Kristofor Kolombit
Jam vetëm, bosh, pa shprehje, te kufiri i jofjalëve.
Peshku Romeo dhe peshku Zhuljeta
u helmuan nga padurimi i dashurisë.
Kështu vetëvritem edhe unë
nga padurimi i historisë.
Më kot e ardhmja më ngushëllon,
më kot utopitë hakmerren për mosbesimin,
duke na tunduar pafundësisht me idetë.
Janë dëshpëruar dhe të vdekurit,
kërkojnë vdekje të dytë.
Unë mbledh lule, që më treten mbas disa sekondash në
duar,
shkruaj libra, që më bëhen të padukshëm
sa i mbaroj.
Peshkatarët ateistë kinse e kapin me rrjeta
peshkun e rrallë Krisht,
që ka në bark unazën
e kryengritësit Spartak.
I ndalur në një ishull të unit,
mes muzgujve egocentrikë,
ndjej si shqetësohet vetmia
ja, një peshk del nga uji në breg
ja, dhe dhjetë peshq, që ecin si këmbë të zbathura,
ja, njëqind peshq që fluturojnmë si zogj në erë,
ja, njëmijë peshq, që kërcejnë si gazela,
duke nxituar drejt meje – o si ngazëllejnë,
ja, dhjetë mijë peshq të rrënjëzuar si pyje përreth,
ja, njëqind mijë peshq,
që më pikojnë si vesë mbi fytyrë,
ja, njëmilion peshq, që i thith si molekula oksigjeni.
© 2000, Moikom Zeqo
From: Zodiak
From: Zodiak
Poems
Poems of Moikom Zeqo
Close
Zodiac: 2
Fish, fish, fish:they’re my footsteps, measured and holy—
the prints of an aerial Gulliver—molecules
and, at the same time, the void.
Each arrival is a return. The bottom is also a beginning.
Fish are biological swords,
aquatic boomerangs.
What magical glue
joins the Milky Way
to a herd of horses,*
the moon
to a pod of dolphins,
an angel
to an insect?
Fish sow grain in the Illyrian necropolis,
then reap Beethoven’s symphonic face.
All the leaves glisten
with a fiery dew.
The caverns reach out to me with their sensory stalagmites.
My shadow drifts like an abstract balloon,
like a sun, across these concrete depths.
Saint George with an aqualung, I once killed
iconographic sharks, Byzantine dragons.
The Sahara is a map of the sea;
the sea offers only its frightening semblance.
Kristoforidhi’s glowworm**
is a circus snake charmer
inside a bottle tossed by the waves
—a discovered home that was never mine.
The muscled, invisible air is covered in wounds:
the scars of rainbows.
Pontius Pilate is washing his hands—
for him, hygiene is more important than Christ.
A mythical fish launches itself—a huge leap—
like the god Redon’s asthmatic sneeze.***
Durrës Bay is the skull
a watery Hamlet holds in his hand.
There’s no longer any doubt about death—
death is my measure of certainty.
Man is the house of the Creator;
outside Man, the Creator disappears.
I leap over a tide pool—
a drop of the devil’s sulfurous sweat.
The wind is a jargon spoken by the air,
which the illiterate stones understand absolutely.
The universe: a floating anthology
constructing an aesthetics of nostalgia
for the memoryless fish—skeptical and brutal.
From the waist up, I’m an albatross;
waist down, I’m fishlike.
The only human part I have left is my navel—
the genesis of the universe.
I play hide-and-seek
among the statues and gods,
appearing and disappearing
behind marble, where I dissolve away.
Inside the mouth of an angel
a tongue becomes a prophetfish—
Jeremiah with fishbones of bronze,
Isaiah with the moon for a tail,
Zachariah covered in scales.
Inside the opacity of dusk, even horses look like flowers,
and a cactus resembles an octopus.
Eternity perches on the backs of ephemeral butterflies,
on a drop of dew about to dry.
All around me: fish, fish, fish—
when they’re separated from each other
they’re even further divorced from God.
They lie below the surface—beneath the membranes of memory.
In Atlantis, they still build temples
and make statues from precious metals—
the people there write on papyrus
in the undersea air of water.
The hero Milosao sleeps in the shadows of fantastic turtles,§
and Hasan Zyko Kamberi sings in praise §§
of unimaginable treasures buried on distant islands.
Atlantis knows nothing of light-rail trains,
of computers and Tele-Bingo,
of TV and condoms. Down there,
they live among Crete’s bull-horned princes,
the bearded fish of Byzantine emperors,
Moby Dick—who is Shakespeare—,
the German poet Hans Magnus Enzensberger,
who, in a cabin of the sunken Titanic, lives and works
by the firelight of his pipe bowl—
its Migjenian inferno §§§
burns the very bones
of Christopher Columbus.
I’m alone here, empty, expressionless, on the edge of wordlessness.
Look over there! Romeofish and Julietfish—
destroyed, as we know, by the longings of love.
Me, too, I destroy myself
with the longings of history.
The future consoles me in vain,
just as utopias take their revenge on our disbelief,
endlessly working to tempt us with their mere ideas.
Even the dead are driven to despair
as they search for their second deaths.
I gather flowers that soon melt away in my hands;
the books I write turn invisible
as soon as I finish them.
Atheist fishermen act as though they’ve caught
that rare fish called Christ—
who carries in his belly the ring
of Spartacus, the insurgent.
I rest on an island of Self
surrounded by egocentric dusks
and the worry of loneliness.
So: a fish emerges from the water and onto the shore.
So: ten fish, sliding forward like bare feet.
So: a hundred fish flying in the sky like birds.
So: a thousand fish leaping ahead like gazelles
and rushing toward me—O what delight!
So: ten thousand fish planting roots around me like trees.
So: a hundred thousand fish
falling like drops against my face.
So: millions of fish, which I breathe like oxygen.
© 2015, Anastas Kapurani & Wayne Miller
From: Zodiac
Publisher: 2015, Zephyr, Brookline MA
From: Zodiac
Publisher: 2015, Zephyr, Brookline MA
Zodiac: 2
Fish, fish, fish:they’re my footsteps, measured and holy—
the prints of an aerial Gulliver—molecules
and, at the same time, the void.
Each arrival is a return. The bottom is also a beginning.
Fish are biological swords,
aquatic boomerangs.
What magical glue
joins the Milky Way
to a herd of horses,*
the moon
to a pod of dolphins,
an angel
to an insect?
Fish sow grain in the Illyrian necropolis,
then reap Beethoven’s symphonic face.
All the leaves glisten
with a fiery dew.
The caverns reach out to me with their sensory stalagmites.
My shadow drifts like an abstract balloon,
like a sun, across these concrete depths.
Saint George with an aqualung, I once killed
iconographic sharks, Byzantine dragons.
The Sahara is a map of the sea;
the sea offers only its frightening semblance.
Kristoforidhi’s glowworm**
is a circus snake charmer
inside a bottle tossed by the waves
—a discovered home that was never mine.
The muscled, invisible air is covered in wounds:
the scars of rainbows.
Pontius Pilate is washing his hands—
for him, hygiene is more important than Christ.
A mythical fish launches itself—a huge leap—
like the god Redon’s asthmatic sneeze.***
Durrës Bay is the skull
a watery Hamlet holds in his hand.
There’s no longer any doubt about death—
death is my measure of certainty.
Man is the house of the Creator;
outside Man, the Creator disappears.
I leap over a tide pool—
a drop of the devil’s sulfurous sweat.
The wind is a jargon spoken by the air,
which the illiterate stones understand absolutely.
The universe: a floating anthology
constructing an aesthetics of nostalgia
for the memoryless fish—skeptical and brutal.
From the waist up, I’m an albatross;
waist down, I’m fishlike.
The only human part I have left is my navel—
the genesis of the universe.
I play hide-and-seek
among the statues and gods,
appearing and disappearing
behind marble, where I dissolve away.
Inside the mouth of an angel
a tongue becomes a prophetfish—
Jeremiah with fishbones of bronze,
Isaiah with the moon for a tail,
Zachariah covered in scales.
Inside the opacity of dusk, even horses look like flowers,
and a cactus resembles an octopus.
Eternity perches on the backs of ephemeral butterflies,
on a drop of dew about to dry.
All around me: fish, fish, fish—
when they’re separated from each other
they’re even further divorced from God.
They lie below the surface—beneath the membranes of memory.
In Atlantis, they still build temples
and make statues from precious metals—
the people there write on papyrus
in the undersea air of water.
The hero Milosao sleeps in the shadows of fantastic turtles,§
and Hasan Zyko Kamberi sings in praise §§
of unimaginable treasures buried on distant islands.
Atlantis knows nothing of light-rail trains,
of computers and Tele-Bingo,
of TV and condoms. Down there,
they live among Crete’s bull-horned princes,
the bearded fish of Byzantine emperors,
Moby Dick—who is Shakespeare—,
the German poet Hans Magnus Enzensberger,
who, in a cabin of the sunken Titanic, lives and works
by the firelight of his pipe bowl—
its Migjenian inferno §§§
burns the very bones
of Christopher Columbus.
I’m alone here, empty, expressionless, on the edge of wordlessness.
Look over there! Romeofish and Julietfish—
destroyed, as we know, by the longings of love.
Me, too, I destroy myself
with the longings of history.
The future consoles me in vain,
just as utopias take their revenge on our disbelief,
endlessly working to tempt us with their mere ideas.
Even the dead are driven to despair
as they search for their second deaths.
I gather flowers that soon melt away in my hands;
the books I write turn invisible
as soon as I finish them.
Atheist fishermen act as though they’ve caught
that rare fish called Christ—
who carries in his belly the ring
of Spartacus, the insurgent.
I rest on an island of Self
surrounded by egocentric dusks
and the worry of loneliness.
So: a fish emerges from the water and onto the shore.
So: ten fish, sliding forward like bare feet.
So: a hundred fish flying in the sky like birds.
So: a thousand fish leaping ahead like gazelles
and rushing toward me—O what delight!
So: ten thousand fish planting roots around me like trees.
So: a hundred thousand fish
falling like drops against my face.
So: millions of fish, which I breathe like oxygen.
© 2015, Anastas Kapurani & Wayne Miller
From: Zodiac
Publisher: 2015, Zephyr, Brookline MA
From: Zodiac
Publisher: 2015, Zephyr, Brookline MA
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