Poems from the book The Decline of Heroes and Dragons
(Junaci i zmajevi u zalasku, Mala zvona, 2022.)
Translation: Goran Čolakhodžić
(growing up)
as caterpillars still climbed up my thighs
tugging on those first, white hairs,
saints fell from the skies
one by one
I put away my fear of stoning into a box,
but sometimes it still slithers out in the middle of the night
and licks my shivering knees with its venomous tongue
I’ve seen the fear of death
in the visits Grandpa would pay to the brandy in the cellar
and in Grandma’s worn out prayer book
and in spasms rippling through skin
the fear of self
lies in the hidden flintlock and the blunt knife,
in unconsumed drugs and unconsumed beds,
in forged-iron shackles on one’s wrists
and all those things had to be written in the dirt with a stick
and all those things had to be passed over in silence
and all those things had to be forgiven
***
the moon’s eyes have been swollen
with insomnia for billions of years,
sometimes we switch places,
sympathize with each other
I give him my bed, even if it’s no nest,
I offer him my bed-linen, even if it’s no fur,
in return he gives me some violet canvas
I can draw on, I splatter the paint with my hair
and let anxiety drip
all across the universe,
Moon and I sympathize with each other
foxes sneak into my lap
and together we count violet-dusted moths,
then they tell me about swiftness and freedom,
resourcefulness and passion, I feel goose bumps listening to them,
imagining a run in the vastness of ancient times
hidden birds remind us
this isn’t something we’ve been ordered to do,
but we enjoy playing tricks and hiding,
we love masks and being on the stage,
what else is there to do
if we can’t sleep
***
under the mask of a bear
you approach the buds of our transience,
you lick the honey clouds and grunt at startled birds
you walk slowly among the beech trees you have wounded,
lowering your melancholy thoughts, paw by paw,
onto the inconspicuous ants,
the mask suffocates you more and more and grows into your tender skin,
it’s flattened your walnut-like nose and bent your strawberry ears
like the corners of a picture book, yet you don’t take it off, fearing touch
fearing the noise of bells and pots you’ve been beaten with
by those who you watched over, fearing the ashes they’ve thrown in your eyes,
the ashes of your falls, stories, truces and proverbs
under the mask of a bear
you wander slowly as if waiting for Gypsies to chain you,
Circus-Performers to cage you, Whites to put a bullet in you
under the mask of a bear
you don’t miss the cross-shaped villages
nor the summits of gigantic, menacing mountains
under the mask of a bear
you’ve forgotten to use your tongue for kisses and song,
you’ve forgotten to use your arms to provide warmth,
you’ve forgotten your crib and your mother and your roars
you’ve become what you’d always wanted to become – a wild animal,
yet lonely
***
we grew up in a single swing of the dragonfly’s wings
the windows haven’t seen dawn for months now
and our hands have become transparent in sugar-fish water,
I waded into the rapids to catch at least one for us,
I snatched nothing out but a blue stone for my breath-islands
hands smell brown and they smell of the forest
Grandma smells of porcini and chestnuts,
we have caught the fear
of woodland mice,
we have learned
how to hide
from others
to huddle behind a tree, inside a tree, in a tree,
to transform our bodies into moss
tongues are tired from boredom,
your fingers are tired from severe idleness,
tell me a story about the explorers of warmer climes,
about their terrible machetes and tiger-claw scars,
silk tents and mosquito bites,
about the thrill of some forgotten city
or the splendour of an ancient tomb
here, darkness has already lain down on skies,
it has stretched its paws over the crowns of trees,
it has stuck silence out on its bristly tongue
and encircled us with its tail – that cruel god of ours
my lungs
are dewy fields of hellebores,
ruined white cities for fairy horses
let’s go to sleep in a miraculous pistil
and wake up in the next decade,
perhaps until then Saint George will have returned from the underworld
and swung his sword toward the dragon’s scaly neck,
in his helmet he might bring the earliest primroses
and the breeze from off your buds
in a dream, playful dragonflies buzz through your eyes,
and when you raise the curtain they might fly out
into our little green room,
perhaps then the wings will return
from those first, soft days
***
at the end of the path
there is a nest, a den, a grove,
a place, warm and tight,
that covers you, hides you, shelters you
when the fists of fathers and grandfathers go berserk
and when the heavens lose their temper
unjustly
and that place needs to be rebuilt
always anew, from picked flowers,
fallen leaves and twigs, tufts of blown wool
and a fistful of warm earth
you are afraid, I know, afraid
of the words family, dwelling, domicile,
kinship, lineage, relatives, childbirth,
all those primary cells of society,
uneasy because they’re unhappy
wounded does are shot out of compassion,
fawns become orphans, and their home is now like jagged lightning,
like gasps of fish out of water, a bottomless wound,
an astonished o, an unvoiced collapse
blood is neither milk nor dew,
it is a log bridge washed away by the swollen river
during sleepless nights we rebuke our ancestors,
they are to be blamed for our imperfect shape,
it is easy to forgive, it is hard to forget,
words are bruises and cuts
taking a turn is sometimes justified so as to avoid further accidents,
crossroads are always dangerous, choices are always the wrong ones
build that den in the ravine, survive the winter
***
the storks are leaving us, descending into amber twilights
I kiss the top of your left shoulder,
I play with the coffee beans in your earlobes
like nesting in a belly of dewy grasses,
soft and secure – that’s how it feels to enter your embrace
you recite to me
friendships are sacred, loves are fleeting,
but in the eyes of the storks everything is fleeting and sacred at once
***
plum jam spills over the skies and my hands,
everything is burnt and sweet, wasps and ants are already coming,
the poems are all written, the gardens are all hoed,
a shard of the forest has pierced my chest, I’ve been whispering
to gentle hares let me be saved, let me be
a child, let me be a child of wax,
let me make the deserted birch groves warm again