Time is a man Time is the golden penny of an aristocrat with a cane – the old bloke, who writes nights in his office. he keeps a clock inside himself, measures hundreds and more - autopsies under the magnifying glass of the dead. Time’s cut up with a sword, little man, a nailed coffin … Continue reading Michaela Angelova: Time is a man

SMALL STORIES She likes to write notes— “I love you” to her husband, “I’m thinking of you” to her child, “Thank you” to her mother. It’s a little ludicrous actually, but her loved ones don’t speak of these things, even pretend they’ve never discovered anything in their pockets. Still, she’s been doing this a while— … Continue reading Olya Stoyanova: Small Stories

Fairness Fairness? The slogan reads: “The music we all love”. From the burglars of military warehouses, stalls overflowing with camouflage equipment and boots, to salesmen lined up on the road to the sea. “The music we all like” is a shelf of pop discs in a petrol station. The field burns. The vase with sunflowers … Continue reading Alexander Nikolov: Fairness

Visit I visit my homeland the way a snail tries to fit back into his old shell. Day after day I writhe inside, counterclockwise. The shell is rough and narrow, opens sores on coddled parts But I persist, eat tarator, cry over graves, until I conform to my old contours. Finally, I am here. Snail … Continue reading Katerina Stoykova: Visit

Bulgarian Literature Month has so far brought you an - of course incomplete - overview regarding books related to our topic. (A few more blog posts are about to follow.) But it goes without saying that there are quite a lot of online resources and journals (in print or electronic form) that also give an … Continue reading Bulgarian literature: Online and print resources – and a poetic experiment

Night and Day  Your transparent shoulders Your transparent eyes Your transparent brain Your transparent womb Your transparent knees At night you shine all over like a central intelligence agency Analysts are walking within calculating the odds At the other end of the world a man is blown up another’s walking on four legs with a … Continue reading Kiril Vassilev: Night and Day

AND ALL THE INDIANS the other day Uncle Manfred passed away may heaven’s light shine on him! let the weather he forecasts always be nice— he was a retired meteorologist celebrated his birthdays year after year with a folk orchestra and buffet in the banquet hall of the school (I have a photo where I … Continue reading Petja Heinrich: And All The Indians

My Tongue, My Enemy Without you—blood in the mouth. I swallow, the Latin serifs scratch. My tongue, my brother. Decorated, perforated— metal ball rolls along the teeth like a perverse arrowhead. Tongue or Death. My tongue, my own carcass. My tongue, another friend whom I’ve betrayed. Shouldering guilt, the innocent start running. My tongue, my … Continue reading Katerina Stoykova: My Tongue, My Enemy

Workers VI  With a helmet swept off the head the strap cutting into the throat Weighing you down to the earth’s lap you’re not her son The petrol field is not mother earth but you’ve lain backwards Over clods of earth lit up like ores from the all-enveloping In this artificial heaven paraffin film huge … Continue reading Vladimir Sabourin: Workers VI

RAIN Half an hour I’ve been standing in the shower and can’t wash off this haunting dream pursuing me for years, in which you abandon me at the farmer’s market in a southern city. The tides of blood discard sand and dead jellyfish in my eyes and I can’t see how you walk away carrying … Continue reading Aksinia Mihaylova: Rain