Преводи на английски | Plamen Sivov’s poetry in English

Преводи на Диана Стефанова

Winter Rain | Зимен дъжд

Oh, how this winter rain would glide along,
descending down the landscape’s bristly curves…
It’s waiting just for our “Come on!”,
but simply, no one’s there to say the words.

Beneath, through the November mist at last,
the color-yielding trees are quiet now,
renouncing their leaves and summer past
and pounding on the sky with bare boughs.

And thus renounced, we gather bitter taste
to ourselves, to our old addresses.
And so it falls again, but not that rain –
begotten, not created, of one essence.

***

Dog-Man | Човекът-куче

The man that they compared to a dog
(because he bears it all with faithful ease)
sits on his hunches, rooted in the ground below,
conversing with the little foxes and the trees.

From down below, the man is watching all the hills
and all trajectories the human beings paint –
they squint against the sunlight, gently sneeze,
and from their talking drizzle words like summer rain.

The sun is peeking out behind the mountain rims
and licks the cloud with drops of gilded glamor.
A rainbow stretches out – so beautiful, it seems.
The man from down below observes, enamored.

The people up there saw him in the evening,
they fluttered over him and laughed into the night.
The man that they compared to a dog
his freedom with their laughter fed and kindly smiled.

***

Solomon’s Bride | Суламит

You came to me, a presence I have known,
you left your perfume trailing in the snow.
The soft enticing figure of a mountain,
the shadows falling like a veil of darkness,
the voices rise in ecstasy around me
to fill the air burning with your memory.
Relentlessly they drown me and they save me,
drown me and save me,
giving and forsaking —
I dream of you from deep within my solitude.
Imprison me with hands, unravel me with eyelids,
inside of you I hope to be redeemed.

The storm is chasing morning to remind me,
the music playing softly in the distance.
I’ll think of you and walk to the horizon,
I’m filled with pain, desire irresistible
to let my passion ripen in the wilderness. 

***

Friday | Петък

Along the trail, an image have you gathered –
the crumbs of memory, an endless day?
The grasses, they are women, it is Friday,
your laughter, once again, is blessed away.

Each pain right here stems from the conception
that brought a day the world can laugh its load –
away from Saturdays and their vengeance
and close enough – a prayer down the road.

You’ll need a thirst to last a lifetime
to lick the point of every mountain peak.
And then to sit down by the river, silent,
down by the verdant moss that warmly speaks,

and there you can play your games of summer…
But still, your feather is in raven black.
That, which you love, is quickly weighing downward;
that, which you chased away, keeps coming back –

to seek you out, and then for you to find it,
so that the both of you can hurt and stay.
When you deceive it, you are sad for trying,
it laughs when you are quiet, just the same.

The ancient trail, the grasses, they are laughing,
the fading day that burns into the deep.
And you would laugh as well, but it is Friday –
your laughter is forgiven, if you weep.

***

4.30 in the Morning | 4.30 сутринта

So early still, at half past four a.m.,
she wakes up in my arms and rises slowly,
to touch me stretches out a quiet hand,
and opening the window, stands to watch me.

So early still, at half past four a.m.,
she searches for the sunrise in the distance,
but doesn’t know it yet, that this is simply death,
disguised as permanence and smiling blissful.

Within the sea of faces, she’s adrift,
her refuge seeking certainty from falling.
This is her country, welcome to her gift,
the autumn of her life unfolding slowly.

What childhood dream she visited of mine,
her secret name in silence as I whispered?
Her features I attempted to divine
beneath the bridal veil, with yearning wistful.

The day will come, and happy noon will shine
above her home with effervescent patience.
She keeps on smiling through her fingers still,
and yet her faith is melting like a glacier.

At half past four a.m., so early still,
the longing has conquered the vague reminiscence,
the thought that undoubtedly somebody will
arrive, spilling seeds in her womb, fill with meaning her spirit.

And a flame in her eyes flickers now, does it not,
does the sweat of the world drench her body to try it?
No one else, but the sun in its fullness will know
what brings her to laughter, what brings her to dying.

And it’s so early still… And we hear the sound
of the poets, exhaustedly yawning from tension,
but with her, just with her they are speaking right now –
our planet’s exuberant senses.

The morning rain will cleanse again
to white the city’s dreams with kisses damp.
And every fallen angel will ascend
so early still, at half past four a.m.

***

Nocturne | Вечерно

She always enters on her own,
arrives on days of cloudless lightness.
The jug of water fills alone
and her initials in the sky keeps writing.

She washes all the old regrets
and does the ironing with patience.
In forecasts quiet weather is expected
when quiet times with her begin descending.

And it will always be the same –
the evening shedding drops in placid gardens.
That special silence bearing her name
waits for your conversation starting.

The setting rays of sunlight find her still
and shades of twilight start to kiss her faintly.
A pencil point, a landscape, color filled –
a woman your entire life is painting.

A sign to you is given not to speak,
perhaps it’s not the time for idle chatter.
And seeing through the eyes of you, she’ll weep;
and breathing through the lungs of you, she’ll matter.

You lost yourself within her fading trace
and out of wisdom failed to keep the secret.
You lost yourself, but know this much is given:
and it will always be the same.

***

A Fountain in the Rain | Фонтан в дъжда

Rain is splashing blue droplets and waving
ropes of moisture all over the ground.
Clear water pours into the pavements,
the cemented pails of this town.

And the square is suddenly empty –
running inside is the plan to embrace.
Just the rain and the fountain remaining,
which had always stood there, in its place.

But it rains and a fountain is senseless,
but it rains and a fountain’s absurd –
wasting water for nothing is reckless…
Mr. Mayor, hello, are we heard?

While it’s raining, the fountain is shameless,
while it’s raining, a scandalous hit…
Out of water we both have been created –
city mud isn’t scary one bit.

See the sky as it drowns in the rain,
in the fishnets of lightning flashes.
This small town may be randomly plain,
yet hotels are too crowded.

And wherever you are, I imagine you so,
as you wait at a bus stop and shiver.
You and I are just two drops of water that flow
pouring back to ourselves, slowly resistant.

Then it stopped. After rain it is simple.
Children play in the puddles and run.
We can warm our elderly figures
at the rays of a star brightly young.

And the square is suddenly living,
without memories and without blame.
And I tell you: the fountain is just a beginning,
and our life – it is only a game.

***

Conversation | Разговор

You asked if I was here still.
You asked me, but I didn’t know.
A shedding sound of evening spilled
and down your tired shoulder rolled.

Watercolor | Акварел

Falling asleep, you will see me –
faithful and yours for the claiming.
I won’t be asking, while caressing your sleep,
if we had been ever related.

Falling asleep, I will see you –
reaching concepts of piety, slowly sipping their taste:
and whatever we love, whatever we’re grieving
is becoming the same thing from which we are made.

The wind, scattering, rearranges the landscapes,
spilling into the spaces – no memory, no goal.
Wildly lifts us away, disobeying, abandoning –
watercolored, our faces merge in one vicious whole.

We can hardly inhale above waters pallid,
brooks are gasping for breath, underground, darkly fated.
Ageing elations and tearless eyelids –
we are born every morning defenseless and naked.

I am blessing the snow, silently shed,
as my footsteps back home are tracing their pattern
to questions that stretch to the morning ahead
and to love, getting worn out and tattered.

Wander in dreams through the valley of books,
Wuthering Heights, and the England of memories…
Twenty years old and in love, as you looked –
who do you think will always remember you?

Try to never look back to seasons and beckonings,
give your song to the world and release it.
Trust a passage that leads to the sea flowing endless,
and then walk on the shore. It’s easy.

***

The Boy with the Exhausted Wings | Момчето с уморените крила

The boy with the exhausted wings remains,
the mirror doesn’t show a friend reflected.
Betrayal is predictably effective.
And guilt is carrying all too many names.

The boy with the exhausted wings remains –
and do you know him, son of angels fair?
What happened to the common past you shared –
did you forget, or fail to understand

the healing flowers, walls of tender stone,
the lips, their bruises from the silence peeling?
The bird out of the cage he will be freeing,
but will he resurrect himself, alone?

The bird will fly above the fallen town ahead,
above the dreams of people bleeding slowly
and, knowing that she’s wingless, she’ll be falling
into a soul – as simple as our bread.

The boy with the exhausted wings remains.
His memory to no one he will bare.
The legs of hope are short – and everywhere
she walks upon familiar terrain;

the flame is burning in her fragile hand,
the remnants of the new beginning pour horizons.
And out of every mirror he is rising –
the boy with the exhausted wings, again.

***

Wish I Could Go On Without You | Искам да мога без теб

Searching patiently the house of my past
to uncover what vanished
through tapes and dusty old records –
some piece of music, just a few notes
that happened a while back, so many years ago…

Truth is, I sought something recorded by chance
when you laughed – twenty seconds of life.

Wish I could go on without –
to resolve you to past tense,
and remember you only on holidays,
and to laugh when finding old photographs,
disassemble the eyes, the smell of your body,
forgetting, forgetting that dimple…

Wish I could go on without you.

At shadowy hours I remember your features.
It was like an old film, we were little and funny.
We hunted for images, sculpting our memories,
and I kept all of this,
but your face only melted away.

Wish I could go on without you,
but the attic of time makes
our hands seem awkward and heavy,
and not even knowing, we have killed our together.

Wish I could go on without –
to misplace the address and the number,
carry on – years and years.
To start learning again how to be loved,
not remember the shape of you
and your hands, touching me, the hurricane raging
and us – the exhausted…

Wish I could go on without you.

***

Daybreak | Утро

Silence as long as eternity –
almost a planet, created.
Seems like from nothing, returning,
into your arms I am staying.

Briefly I travelled, yet distances
bloodied my feet as they smoldered.
Firm, the horizon is lifting
sunrises over your shoulder.

Dawn will descend its redemption
into our pains intermingled,
and I will find in their tremors
something that I will be wishing.

Wishing for us to be genuine –
only ourselves; simply sounding:
I’ll be your thirst through the emptiness,
you’ll be my water boundless.

Wishing our dreams a prediction,
magical summer unspoken,
ancient and cobbled-stoned fiction,
cherries and linden tree blossoms.

Your mountainous ridges await me,
slowly the hill I am climbing.
Glowing in twilight, your face is
lighting my way like an icon.

***

*** | ***
My best acquaintances are those
With whom I spoke no word
Emily Dickinson

Both love and enmity are known
by the intensity of silence.
With quietness we punish our foe,
a friend rewarding likewise.

We harbor silent tendernesses and disdains,
subdued to hush by rage… Or otherwise, by pleasure?
But once we slip a bit, our conscience, aged,
erases the between-dividing measure.

***

Sometimes | Понякога

Sometimes I stay too long inside the hour
that lies between “I love” and “I desire.”
I wonder, if these tracks were music sheets,
what would the streetcar sing with morning’s choir?

Within the space dividing “past” from “present”
where thoughts of you are licking and caressing
incessantly my palms, my eyes, and temples –
so thrice I curse myself a moment later…

Through morning high above and rushing dreams,
the slamming of the sunrise comes at last.
I leave, and still ahead, among the grass
the Lord is striding,
wise and carefree.

It’s cleverly designed, and so relentless –
the stream that bears your tender name is crawling.
In front of me, its final droplets emptying.
I am becoming past tense now – since our world is conquered.

Sometimes I stay too long inside the hour.
Not daring a single taste of sunlight.
But differently the sun today was rising.
Not like a sunrise. Like a liturgy, triumphant.

***

Dual Citizenship | Двойно гражданство

The country of the other life unfolds,
invisibly and quietly existing
across nine ocean laps of swimming distance
and through one more – a bridge to the untold.

To find it takes you centuries. Or mute,
a moment on your knees is long enough.
Words there derive from just one verb, “to love”
and only water guns are used to shoot.

It’s bright, no clear boundary between
one’s slowly heading off or taking flight,
or yearning for the sea or mountain heights,
or footsteps left by strangers or by kin.

Through the abyss, around the park you took
the path that led you to the water spring,
a turn, and then the house of John within.
Beyond to Mark, to Matthew, and to Luke.

And joy is simply pouring from the gutters,
the children, sneezing, splash each other, playing.
Here, men of wit debate in verses, saying
that poetry is scientific matter.

The yards, the pots of lilac blooms that sway,
a man returning on a ray of light…
The news, unaltered, always told inside –
of Him, Who loved us in a perfect way.

From chimneys fragrance in the twilight streams
of all the forest herbs in one bouquet.
The sky above is pregnant with our weight
until our lives are over like a dream.

The pains of labor trickle down in sweat –
the only kind permitted to the sky
inside the country of the other life,
the birthplace of the poets who are dead.

And we, who in the afterlife believe,
its frequencies finding, hide the tracks.
It’s here, though. The “after” ones are we –
and frankly, there’s forgiveness in that fact.

Come holidays, for entry stamps we line
in churches – embassies to heaven – hungry
for bread and wine, for visas and abundance
inside the country of the other life.

***

A Warm Welcome | Посрещане

One octave full of silence plays.
One mellow April afternoon.
I hear the early bees, and they
speak of the summer coming soon –

upon the hour when the light
begins to swarm, its breathing heavy,
and winter painfully resides
along the tips of grassy meadows.

The barking of a dog. The sigh
of blossoms from the anxious trees,
and last year’s nest that sits inside
collecting coins of sunlight ease,

in hopes to purchase yet once more
the downy feathers of new flights,
and songs, and fear of the claws
of Grizzly cats that prowl the night,

the beating of new life to start
within its empty straw embraces…
The weathered nest becomes a heart –
its flock today anticipating.

One octave full of silence plays.
Beyond it – spring, and not a sound.
The flock, resembling a man,
keeps stumbling across the clouds.

***

Premonition | Предчувствие

A hundred years from now this street will be unchanged again –
the flowerpots, the pavement, and the seven ancient chestnuts.
Each morning trolley bells will wake the houses with the same refrain,
and birds in trees will sing their concerts, festively.

A happy woman will appear on the balcony,
the fragrant smell of ironing and coffee in her distance.
A child against the sunlight squinting, will be wondering,
reflecting on the secret source of his existence.

And someone will be hurrying home to write his syllables.
The sky above will seem increasingly indifferent.
The world will be supported by the slender filaments,
the hands of hope preserving everything invisibly.

And like a barren acorn shaken from its greenery,
a hollow life will fall toward the winter, rolling.
An old man’s reverie will feed his pigeon for the last time, keenly.
The current times will claim to be the last, as always.

And so much mercy will suffuse the air tenderly
that winds will scatter it by handfuls. Life, regarded
another hundred years from now, will stay unwavering.
And I’ll be someone who was here briefly –
and departed.

Your Life is Also Mine | Твоят живот е и мой

Fading sound of guitars, skies colder above.
Left behind us, how many songs!
Two last cigarettes, coffee still in the cups.
On the road home, you are always alone.

Every past has expired, every dream slowly burnt.
I am tired. Is there no one who can
stand beside me and tell me, without saying a word:
“Look at me now. Your life is also mine.”

I’d like to be walking back to you, quietly
through a sea of people rushing along,
touching each of your smiles with my hand tenderly,
memories are our stories and songs.

Every pain to acknowledge, no make-up or shame,
wading into pouring rain and the grime,
and whenever at night I am holding your hand,
just to tell you: “Your life is also mine.”

And perhaps I’ll be walking a long time ahead,
I’ll forget the crowds and the season,
the unravelling youthfulness down to a thread,
and my outcome that waits for a reason.

Through the darkness your white hand is searching for me,
I’ll be your clown in the old pantomime.
But your laughter is real – like it used to be.
Hold me closer. Your life is also mine.

Fading sound of guitars, skies colder above.
Left behind us, how many songs!
Two last cigarettes, coffee still in the cups.
On the road home, you are always alone.

***

Autumn | Есен

Afflicted with autumn, the trees begin weeping,
repenting by shedding their leaves in the distance,
confessing their summer freneticalism,
their sunshine-deficient character weakness.

Perhaps the aching will continue still
and gutters, ice-cemented,
will pound the frozen window panes until
the hands of spring would let them enter.

And each following autumn chases you down the park,
through the foliage the soles of her feet thudding clear –
but you have just a thin coat in the dark
as a shield from her words getting near.

Will the warmth in that voice from your memory fade,
our souls that caresses with soft, pastel kindness?
Get in under my coat, we’ll imagine this way:
Autumn days are the portholes in the hull of a ship
that dissolves through the beautiful sunset in silence.