THERE…!
The ruins of my house are waiting for me
as well as the swallows that rarely come by
Dead lilies are waiting for me underneath
my ancestorsโ shadows alive still nighโฆ
Cobblestones’re waiting to kiss my feet
Silence on hills keeps memories like none
the patch of the sky and the vine that weeps
the vaulted gate that looks at the sun.
The fruitless trees are waiting for me
My lovely courtyard where my God would sit
My dogโs sad shadow is waiting for me
since I left home, tho’ I shouldn’t leave.
My mother’s waiting and praying with psalms
when wings of the dusk spread over the city
the roaring of the sea and the severe storms
as well as the well full of sorrow and pity.
The seagull is buried inside a small wave
the fresh source of thousands of broken pots
memories imprisoned within a mere word
The river that flows neither turns nor stops.
My sorrow is waiting for me on the rocks
the silence now grizzly in upper-lower case
In fever the tree lips are quivering in talks
And the leaves are withered, dreams are displacedโฆ
The ruins of my house are waiting for me
as well as the swallows that rarely come by
Dead lilies are waiting for me underneath
my ancestorsโ shadows alive still nighโฆ
Translation from Albanian into English
By Alfred Kola
