Guess Who?* (I)

Mr. L in Athens

Mr. L., has never been married

He likes uzo in the morning

And makes La Gioconda sketches repeatedly

He likes the idea of museums except

The forever white. And he doesn’t look

Directly to the eyes of young boys

Mr. L lives near to the Omonia square, far from Florence

.

In the balcony of a geometrically defined silence

He hosts his ghost quests from youth

But none of them stays overnight

Betrayal is one sided, he writes into his notebook

.

He sometimes thinks of his first painting lessons

Before fame, arrogance and craving

Now, in Athens, with a fishing line in his hand

Just at the well of eternity

He finds eternity is nonsense

.

A white handsome young boy passes by

He holds his head down

.

And prefers to watch his own liquid memory

Betrayal is two sided like the surface of water

Mr L. doesn’t write this into his notebook

Katerina Illipoulou or Efe Duyan

* "Guess Who" texts are a series of poems which have been written during Crear Workshop, in Scotland. They can be considered as a game among the Wordexpress writers, so that one poet tries to imitate the style, themes and way of thinking of another poet. On the other hand, those poems indicate a significant outcome of poetry translation process (in Crear) during which the writers tried to get into the other's world- and, in fact, a clear sign of that they did it.


News

Word Express writer Ognjen Spahić from Montenegro will be visiting London for events with his UK publisher, Istros Books, from the 15th - 18th of May. See the Istros Books website for more details.

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This year's Prague Book Fair - Svet Knihy - is focusing on literature the Black Sea region. Word Express writers   Ivan Hristov (Bulgaria),  Zaza Koshkadze (Georgia) and  Pelin Özer  (Turkey) will talk about their Balkan literary journey and read their work at the gala evening.  Go to the Literature Across Frontiers website for more details.

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Word Express interviews Georgian poet Zaza Koshkadze, and talks to Owen Martell and Milan Dobricic about translating and publishing Owen's novel into Serbian after meeting on the Word Express journey. All on the Travel Blog.

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