Poetry

By

Irsa Ruci

Lost

Loneliness is the trace of a barefooted step

Carved between the dust of that path

Where years leave nothingness

Like the witness of existence.

The hour-hand’s reverse, reality changes

In the small hungry faces

For attention

For presence

To give to disappointment something less

That the orphan destiny

That are inherited in the hyenas’ wars

In that cold weather of the new century!

The cherry blossoms have springed earlier

Now no one is reminded to grab the fruit

That sometimes were enjoyed by childish grabbing

That only oblivion can redden the pavements

With the fruit-bearing blood.

Even the sparrows sing faded

While were leaving

Away from this counting filled with insane

Owls!

(Translated by Silva Daci)

A comeback in dreams…

Sometime… years before I was poetry-struck

I was protected by the toys from the strangers outside the threshold!

I took care of dolls, sew them bride dresses

And just like myself I fed them with dreams…

I would decorate with them the corners of my home

Until my mother’s threats frightened me

And I collected all by myself before they ended up

In the trash bin

Furthermore, I was excited while playing football with the guys

But the quarrels between us became a serious problem

(girls are taught since infancy to act like ladies)

And it wasn’t graceful of me;

In the adult’s meetings my misbehavior

Was getting notorious

For what I would represent one day;

The inheritance of femininity!

Meaning, I had to learn how to play with myself

So I gained the ability to play with the lines

I accepted as my co-traveler poetry

Sensitivity, elegance;

I sought the beauty of the heart

And I merged it with my thoughts, my frailty,

My attitude, my personality.

Now I have to invent some other games

Because the adults’ games lack fantasy

To find in the a exhausted run of imagination,

Energy for inspiration

Feel myself a leaf in free-fall

(even that to breath freely in this epoch is hard)

Between ‘was’ and ‘will be’

Lies as a spider bed

One ‘can have’

One is never enough grown as to give up from childhood…

(Translated by Silva Daci)

(First published in The Aquillrelle Wall of Poetry, book six)

Irsa Ruci

Irsa Ruçi is an Albanian Writer, Speechwriter and Lecturer. She was born in Tirana (Albania), in 1990. Her books of poetry include Trokas mbi ajër (poems and essays), 2008 and Pështjellim (poetry), 2010. She has been published in anthologies: Antologji, 2007; I kërkoj agimit vesën, 2008; Antologji poetike “Kushtuar dashurisë”, 2014; Antologji poetike “Udha”, 2014; Antologji poetike, 2014; “Malli dhe brenga nga distancat”, 2014; Antologji poetike “Qyteti”, 2014; Poeteca, 2015; and her works has appeared in a number of print and online national and international magazines, including Sling Magazine, Issue 5; Ann Arbor Review, Issue 15; Poeteca Magazine, Issue 35; Aquillrelle Anthology, 2015, Aquillrelle Anthology, 2016, Metaphor Magazine Issue 5, The Commonline Journal, Issue 4/22 A New Ulster poetry anthology, april 2016 etc. And Among many awards, she has received the first prize in poetry, in competition “Anthology 2007”, as the best poet in Albania.