HANIBAL ANTE PORTAS - poetry by RIZA LAHI


HANIBAL ANTE PORTAS

 VETERAN PILOTS    

Threw a palm land on opened grave
Where were crying at all.

They approached  silently to mortal dinner’s table
     Set down
           Afflicted a little
                 Took a sip raki
                     And did
                            Jokes.

All their life they had played with death …
                    
I know to everybody:
   The grudges
       The deceits
           The modesty
               The egoism
                  The dirtiness
                    The frenzies
                          The apathy
                               The strength
                                  The weakness
                                      The rushes
                                           The laughs
                                               The tears

All they had a lover
To whom
     They
           Told everything
                Gave everything
                       Everywhere only laughed
                               And
                                     Never
                                              Betrayed….
      Was
            That: 
                  The sky
                         Over 
                                  Homeland.
                     
                                                                    Note – written on a death ceremony
Translated in Hindu from Dr. Harish K Thakur
Associate Professor, RKMV, Shimla, India, 171001
Poet, Critic, Story ëriter, Researcher




老練な操縦士
VETERAN PILOTS

ぽっかりといたされた一握土地
そこはばかりだった
かに夕食のテーブルに 
   
座って
           少し考え込んで
                 ラキをすすり
冗談を交わした
 
でたのがらの人生

 みんな分かっている
    その敵意
        その地獄絵
            その内気
                その自己主義
                   そのいやらしさ
                       その激しさ
                           その冷淡
                                その無力
                                   その弱さ
                                       その活力
                                            その笑い
                                                その涙
                   
 みんな愛人をもっていた
 彼らが
       何でも話せる人
            何でも与えて
                 笑いだけが残る所で
                            そして
                                       決して
                                               裏切ることがなく...
    それは
                  故郷の空のこと
                                          死の儀式で書かれた詩
                                       死の儀式で書かれた詩   Note – ëritten on a death ceremony


ΒΕΤΕΡΑΝΟΙ  ΠΙΛΟΤΟΙ
ΒΕΤΕΡΑΝΟΙ  ΠΙΛΟΤΟΙ
 
 
Έριξαν μια χούφτα χώμα στον ανοιχτό τάφο
Εκεί που όλοι έκλαιγαν
 
Πλησίασαν αθόρυβα στο τραπέζι με το μνημόσυνο δείπνο
Κάθισαν
      Κάπως λυπημένοι
          Πήραν μια γουλιά ρακί
              Και
                   Αστειεύτηκαν.
 
Σ’ όλη τους τη ζωή έπαιζαν με το θάνατο…
 
Γνωρίζω πολλά για τον καθένα τους:
Τις έριδες
   Τις απάτες
      Την μετριοφροσύνη
         Τον εγωισμό
            Την ατιμία
                Τις εντάσεις
                    Την απάθεια
                         Τη  δύναμη
                            Την αδυναμία
                                  Τις βιασύνες
                                     Τα γέλια
                                           Τα δάκρυα
 
Όλοι αυτοί είχαν έναν εραστή
Σε αυτόν
        Έλεγαν
          Τα πάντα
               Έδιναν τα πάντα
                    Παντού γελαστός
                         Και
                                  Ποτέ
                                       Δεν τους πρόδωσε…
                                          Ήταν
                                                 Αυτός:
Ο Ουρανός
Πάνω
Απ’ την Πατρίδα.
 
translated by Vassiliki Ergazaki, Athens



PILOTËT E VJETËR

Hodhën nga një grusht dhe në varrrin e hapur
ku qanin të gjithë.

Iu afruan të heshtur tavolinës së mortit.
U ulën
     Pikëlluan ca
          Pinë dhe nga pakëz raki
                Dhe bënë shaka.

Kishin luajtur me vdekjen tër jetën.

Unë ua njoh të gjithëve:
Mëritë,
  Djallëzitë,
       Modestitë,
          Egoizmin,
             Pisllëqet,
                Furinë,
                  Plogështinë
                    Fuqinë
                      Dobsinë
                         Të qeshurat
                             Lotët

Që të gjithë këta
E patën një të dashur
      Që i treguan gjithëçka
          Që i falën gjithëçka
              Që i qeshën gjithëmonë
                   Që nuk e tradhëtuan kurr...

    Hapsirën mbi atdhe.


                         Shënim – kjo poezi është shkruar në një ceremoni vdekjeje

Translated from English to  Japan by Poet Kae Morii,
poet, member of  International Writers and Artists
Associationn (ËAAC)ËPS, IËA and GHA. Given birth  in Osaka, Japan.



SHKODRA PICTURED WITH BULLETS

I have a gunbelt filled with empty cartridges
I have collected them in the streets
I have collected them as hens collect worms
I have nothing to write with
In Shkodra you can not find neither paper
Nor fountain pens nor pencils
Only bread
Bread and Serbian „Zastava“            (a type of Serbian revolver)
Today in Shkodra
With a credit note you can buy just one kilogram of bread.


„Where are you going?!  Turn back!
The curfew begins at eight o’clock
But you really should turn back, its better to turn back
Why?  Its midday!  Can’t you see?
Everyone is locked inside their homes
Turn back!“

„Let me be, please, I’m begging you
Leave me alone, I’m repeating, can you hear my plea?
I have frightening strengths that could break chains
No one in this World could stop me from seeing my Shkodra
Seeing how she looks without her laughter, without her poets, her singers
I’ve come from far away to see my Shkodra
I’ve come to kiss her.“

I’m angry and I’m weeping
I’m weeping aloud without shame
I’m weeping for my Shkodra
Where its forbidden to laugh after midday.

How astonishing…its so much as if
I’m unconsciously standing in front of this tile from my home
Now I’m holding this tile to my chest on which in reality
I’ve written with one of my cartridges
Which I feel has rotted as my bitten nails carve into
This tile from my home
Which saw me being pampered
Which saw me as I grew into adulthood
Which observed me
Admiring in silence the hairs in my secret body places…
I’m happy…Happy, because I have another cartridge left.
Who are you?  Pleading for me to come inside
Afraid of any stray bullets?
Are you…Are you my mother?
Oh Mother dear, the bullets have nothing to do with me
If I were afraid of the bullets
I should not have come to be in the midst of them from afar
Just to see my Shkodra
And you, my mother.

Let me be, Mother,
I’m writing with this empty cartridge on the tile which was placed
On the occasion of your Wedding
Maybe this cartridge killed somebody
And now it is writing
How beautifully it is writing…
On the tile from your wedding
Do you remember Ma?  When you
For the first time crossed over this threshold
And you were dressed only in white
The merry wedding ghost
Put this tile to remember for ever
This special day?  Now
See how wonderfully this empty cartridge is writing and how
My hand is moving like an earthquake.
„Shall I come with you?“
„No Mum…turn back
Go to the kitchen and prepare me some bread and cheese
And don’t forget – a very big onion, and
Afterwards a cup of tea
I’ll not be late, but if
I’m late
Take this key and
Keep it to your chest, You
Should open my suitcase which I brought last night from Tirana, I
Left this suitcase by our book case
Just above your wedding boy where you
Used to keep my poems long ago when
I used to fall asleep as I wrote them and you used
To be afraid that others
Would tease me and my poems
On nights I used to read them, and you
Used to guard them like the panther guards her kittens.
There, Mother I
Have locked inside something white.  I
Have locked inside
My Shroud.“

I’ve now finished my second cartridge.
I have strolled around the skies and seas, but if
It is decided that I die today, please
Ask me, it is quite normal to ask a person about to die for
His final request.  I
Would like…Suddenly this cold to turn to Summer, and
To observe my Shkodra full of beachgoers, and me
Swimming on my back in the Banu                     (a river in Shkodra)
Below willows and willows
Below Shkodra’s citadel, full of eagles and seagulls, and
…My G-d
Take my heart, You
My G-d, If
You exist anywhere, come and
Take me but
In Paradise, please
Let me rest somewhere near Shkenderbeg.

Oh…So many shootings over the streets of Shkodra
Somebody is killed by a stray bullet, but
A wounded person is shot with 4 bullets
In hospital, on the operating table whilst Doctors are
Sewing his wounds.
Astonishingly this Spring
Neither the Linden flower nor the Magnolia has flowered
Nor the Mimosa this year and nobody has remembered that
Spring is the season of love.

Last night
Especially last night there
Have been
Awful gunshots, terrible gunshots…

I’m walking like a somnambulist through the streets of Shkodra
Strolling around the empty veins of my birth city
It seems that i pain the criminals
And suddenly, in their hearts, seeing me almost crazy
Clemency awakes, some such delicate feelings of
Clemency can be found in the criminals‘ hearts who
In these moments
Have decided not to shoot me and I
Don’t know why?

Oh my brothers – criminals, You are free
To shoot me.  Kill me my brothers, we
Are of the same blood and you
Should be sure in your hearts that nobody will revenge my death
I’m disarmed and I’m giving my honest word that I will not
Give my last breath
Cursing.
Still no one is shooting at me.

Tomorrow in Shkodra
A multi national troop force will come
Full of males.

This Spring people have only artificial flowers in their homes.

Very few flowers have bloomed this April or
At least I haven’t noticed them
In fact I haven’t seen a single flower anywhere.

Mother, I can’t bear to see Shkodra
Without people without joking but
Full of gun shots coming from who knows where.

Tomorrow
The helmets will pass below the railings full of beautiful girls
Very poor, very hungry.

Mother, now I’m late and
Your tea is cold and
Maybe you have taken out my shroud.
Its for me, Mother, this shroud, You
Should go on to live another hundred years
Yes…yes…Another hundred years to show
For your handsome son – your son whose
Last will before his death was to swim on his back down the Buna
Below the citadel, below the weeping willows that stroke like violins.
You should explain to everyone
That this poor poet, your son, has gone to Paradise
And rests in a place somewhere near Skenderbeg
In Eternity
And is thinking, my son
Only for Shkodra
And only enjoying a certain kind of music
The clanging of the sword.

 
  1997, Tirana, Albania


                      From David Halley,  Crystal Club 01.11.1999

SHKODRA PICTURED IN BULLETS

This weekend I had the pleasure to meet an Albanian author and poet…and as I waited for a friend to get out of a meeting, he struck up a conversation, asking me about myself, where I was from, my profession, what I was doing in Albania, and what had brought me to the region. As our conversation drifted from one topic to another, I was amazed to discover how well read, well spoken, and well thought was this simple man from Shkodra ( a city in northern Albania)
Riza was delighted to hear about my plan for starting a drop in center for homeless youth in Albania, and quickly offered to assist our NGO in any capacity that he could. He went on to tell me about a few authors he knew who wrote children’s books, and assured me that they too would be interested in getting involved in one capacity or another. He gave me the contact information for five or six of them, and told me that he would be happy to provide me with more if our NGO needed them.
As the hour slipped by I once again heard the tale of the horrible events of 1997. How the financial pyramid scheme some crafty businessmen set up a few years before had finally fallen apart like a house of cards, taking with it the central government, all vestiges of authority and stability that had existed in Albania since the end of communist state, and completely plundered while the police stood idly by with their backs turned it sends chills down my spine. People say that for the next few days bullets rained from the sky and the injuries and deaths that occurred were far too numerous to count.
Braving the chaos, Riza left his home in Tirana and travelled noth to Shkodra to visit his mother and bear witness to the chaos occurring in his home town. Once there he felt compelled to venture out –of-doors and see with his own eyes how his birth place had been transformed from a quiet , gentle town into something out of Dante’s Infermo. Ignoring the pleas of his mother, he left the safety of her home and walked the streets. With tears in his eyes and sadness in his heart the likes of which he had never before known he saw firsthand just how far into madness his people had descended.
The emotions that stirred within him, impossible to bear, compelled him to write of this experience. But there was no paper, pens or pencils with which to pour out the pain that presses against his soul. So Riza collected  spent cartridges from the streets and sidewalks, took them back to his mother ‘s home, and upon pieces of tile he found there he spent the night scratching and scraping a poem, a poem that contained all the pain snd suffering that a man who had witnessed his momeland’s transformation into insanity could bear.
Riza presented me with a translated copy of poem he wrote on that dreadful night. It is a poem filled with such beautiful sadness and despair that is impossible to read without bringing me to tears. It is also something that I will treasure for the rest of my life.

The time I spend with Riza Lahi was probably one of the most inspiring hours that I have had since arriving in Albania. The stories and emotions he shared with me warmed my heart and reminded me that there are still beautiful people left in this world. If I can only learn to keep my level of cynicism down and my eyes open I will occasionally see past the filth, drek, garbage , and selfishness that humanity seems to be drowning in, and find the gems hidden there
----------------
       Hats off to your creative talent..
Your best at defining pain, agony, loneliness, and the suppressed wishes,
 Your piece, “Shkodra pictured on bullets” is a diamond for my journal. Hope
 our relation will endure in future.
Warm regards                                                             
           Dr. Harish K Thakur -  Poet, Critic, Story writer, Researcher.  Shimla -India.

---------------
Riza,
I read your poem “Shkodra pictured in bullets” earlier and it made me cry.. I finished it and had to get up for a while and take fresh air.. that poem went deep inside my soul..
Later I came back and read the rest.. I was happy in a way, to see that was long time ago..but still hurts......
You were able to paint with words the pain surrounding you....you made mi vizualize it all.. how terrible...
My friend.. what a poem you wrote!!!  a narrative poem that tells a sad story...
I'm honored you shared it with me.
Thanks you
Marily

Marily A. Reyes (MAR) (Litt. Dr.)
Executive Director/President
The Cove/Rincón International, USA

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