Apocrypha
I
The mission
‘My God, such a beautiful wench,’
Abraham exclaimed,
‘But why would she have me
when I am so ugly?’
Uriel looked at him
as if seeing him for the first time.
‘Yes, truly.’
‘Truly, yes.’
The two sat on a stone
at the side of the road, sipping drinks.
The archangel folded his wings
across his back.
‘Fine, then,’ Abraham said.
‘Great things are expected of me
and I don’t even have the basic means.’
Uriel raised a winged shoulder.
‘Let me sort out your fringe.’
It was getting dark.
The two stayed to wait for Sarah
on the road, wishing they knew
a little more clearly
why they’d been sent.
II
How King David wrote the Psalter
David wrote 356 Psalms,
steeped them in lead
and threw them into the sea.
‘If this scroll be true,’
he said, ‘let it emerge from the water.’
A whale ate it, fishermen
caught it, hauled out the scroll.
David remained unconvinced.
‘Water’s too easy,’ he said
and threw the Psalter into a crater
to see how it would come out.
The scroll fell on an eagle’s back
and again came back to the people.
‘Hmmm,’ said David. ‘I see
I’ll have to think of something else.’
‘David,’ said a voice from Heaven.
‘Don’t push it.’
III
Of the meeting between Jacob and Joseph
… and the father lamented:
‘Son, son,
to find you my eyes
abandoned me,
to reach you my legs
were worn away.’
And the son looked
at the clock and said:
…
(page torn here)
Translated by Tom Phillips
The original Bulgarian text was published in: ‘The Garden of Expectations and the Opposite Door’ (2012), Colibri Publishers, Sofia, Bulgaria.
The game
I was playing cards with God and He
trumped my king with a pair.
‘But Lord, according to the rules,
you can’t do that.’ I waved
my fan of cards.
‘Then come up
with some explanation,’ He replied.
And dealt another hand.
Translated by Tom Phillips
The original Bulgarian text was published in: ‘The Garden of Expectations and the Opposite Door’ (2012), Colibri Publishers, Sofia, Bulgaria.
Dear passengers
The hospital – network of corridors,
memory regularly scrubbed, grey zone
of meeting and farewell, portal past which
calendars no longer work.
You go in quietly, on tiptoe, and above
is intensive care – international airport
with bedridden clients.
‘Dear passengers,’ came the silent voice
of the pilot with folded wings.
‘We’re about to take off.
Loosen your seatbelts, please.’
‘What’s he saying?’ asked
the man with an amputated leg.
‘It’s not about you,’ replied
the woman in a coma.
Translated by Tom Phillips
The original Bulgarian text was published in: ‘Dear Passengers‘ (2018), Izdatelstvo za poezia DA, Sofia, Bulgaria;
The English text appeared first in: Blackbox Manifold
Sometimes together again
In myself I carry days
with no longer existing furniture
and light which left the earth
a long time ago.
I lunch with my loved ones there,
I hand my mother the salt-cellar, not the salt,
I wanted the black pepper, thank you,
you've poured me a lot, take some away,
no need, it’s fine, dad, when you leave,
don’t rush, let’s wait for your gran,
when are you leaving? Will you be first to leave?
They’re at ease, make
effortless movements.
Again and again they dance the dance
that's been danced before.
And I’m there and I’m dancing.
And I, and I.
Don’t forget me.
Translated by Tom Phillips
The original Bulgarian text was published in: ‘Dear Passengers‘ (2018), Izdatelstvo za poezia DA, Sofia, Bulgaria;
The English text appeared first in: Blackbox Manifold
At one of the stops in time
That night the restaurant lights
shone around your head and outside
travelled on towards stars.
Beyond every table, cars passed
each other on the street, their drivers
briefly able to glimpse
the happy tunnel at whose end
we’d wrapped our legs. The glow
of cigarettes, outdoor heaters and
a bottle of red wine were topping up
our blood, and we sat there
one against the other, poring over
each other’s eyes, gifting each other
thoughts in the long silences
and we walked, holding hands,
through a city of open windows
in which time remains unknown.
How many times I pass through
the same place, I see
that we still live there.
Translated by Tom Phillips
The original Bulgarian text was published in: ‘Dear Passengers‘ (2018), Izdatelstvo za poezia DA, Sofia, Bulgaria;
The English text appeared first in: Blackbox Manifold
#Revolt
Proletarians of every country,
go onto Twitter,
unite your opinions,
kill the rich with sarcasm,
wag your thumbs on Facebook,
your middle fingers on forums
and drown power on TV
with tons of virtual blood!
We are indignant.
We are all scorn.
They’re lying to us.
We know they’re lying to us
and they lie to us some more.
We can’t live like that anymore!
And so we live.
Translated by Tom Phillips
The original Bulgarian text was published in: ‘Dear Passengers‘ (2018), Izdatelstvo za poezia DA, Sofia, Bulgaria.
You and I
People come into your head
and disturb you – you told me
with appropriate added gestures:
forefinger touching your forehead,
eyes holding firmly to mine.
And I thought how much angrier
is the world you inhabit,
doing battle with krakens,
snakes, humanoid machines
with curious leanings
and clinging trunks
that seem at best to be
looking for your friendship. And how
much more warped the world I live in –
closed, unreliably sunny, with pollen
to scatter, with feathers to pluck,
with endless letters
and happily startling meetings.
Without you I’m air without a balloon,
a mouth without a tongue, a tongue without a bell,
an alphabet without language. Lungs without air.
And together
we raise a great noise.
Translated by Tom Phillips
The original Bulgarian text was published in: ‘Dear Passengers‘ (2018), Izdatelstvo za poezia DA, Sofia, Bulgaria;
The English text first appeared in: Blackbox Manifold
Through the window of a song
This is not simply a song, simply a mouth.
It’s a hole the eternal world bursts through,
the breath of true chaos where intentions
are primordial sparks. Every sense
is equally awake, unreconciled, undistorted,
the point exists only for itself, time
has yet to be born.
It’s a gap the most ancient songs burst through
on their leather wings,
a narrow window onto that
which maybe we were
and which we could be.
Windows. They open, they close.
The fear of draught makes us extra careful.
Are you frightened of the dark?
With you – no.
Translated by Tom Phillips
The original Bulgarian text was published in: ‘Dear Passengers‘ (2018), Izdatelstvo za poezia DA, Sofia, Bulgaria;
The English text first appeared in: Blackbox Manifold
One morning when for me everything was fine
How come I didn’t notice the chasms all around us?
Here this man makes his bed above the chasm
and is joyous. This woman unlocks her house
with two keys and enters a chasm with another.
Some prefer to run over the chasms,
for others it’s more important to be public,
helping the competitors,
giving advice.
I face a still more unclear transition,
still more things
to get over.
The chronometer is prepared
to be lenient, but not
to show me the way.
Or to measure my panic.
Why am I here?
Why does life exist at all?
Why doesn’t the world fall apart
like everything else we give
special care to?
Paper can’t know
what's written on it.
Paper can only become a boat
and swim for a certain time.
Translated by Tom Phillips
The original Bulgarian text was published in: ‘Dear Passengers‘ (2018), Izdatelstvo za poezia DA, Sofia, Bulgaria.
Gifts of the weather
Autumn presents two coats:
one for the cold, the other –
for later on.
The day quickly abandons us.
The trees strew us with leaves,
with silence, a great finger
pressed to the lips behind.
We enter the dark, embrace
in its feather quilt,
sink into the earth, tell
stories around the kettle.
The snow overwhelms us.
Then we’ll scratch a way out
towards the light again, to pick
cherries together.
When the second coat’s turn comes,
I want to look good in it.
Translated by Tom Phillips
The original Bulgarian text was published in: ‘Dear Passengers‘ (2018), Izdatelstvo za poezia DA, Sofia, Bulgaria;
The English text first appeared in: Blackbox Manifold
Recovery
Illness wraps me in a feather quilt
the cold spears through.
Stupor holds me between
blurred reality and unreal dreams.
‘Care for a cup of tea’ I hear your voice
through my closed eyes,
while I’m saving
hanging children
in multicoloured costumes.
It must be the medicine.
On the fifth day vitamin C will expel
the free radicals and populate me
with anxious conservatives.
Translated by Tom Phillips
The original Bulgarian text was published in: ‘Dear Passengers‘ (2018), Izdatelstvo za poezia DA, Sofia, Bulgaria.
Today when the lighthouses are vanishing
The radio was as laden as a galleon
for a long voyage, a Noah’s Ark for a single beast
that growled and roared and howled.
I put my fingers on the buttons’ teeth,
pushing them one after the other.
A green eye – deep and alert –
was coming to life, but stayed silent.
The box was gaining power, gaining strength.
(Old appliances demanded respect. They waited
to get it.) After briefly warming up,
the radio would start sailing
across the sea of information. Under the canvas
of its hidden funnel music would start gushing out.
Official news emerged from the roar, then plunged back
into the fog of white noise. Politics lived on islands
of grey words where endless speeches
repeated them in a new order.
Distant stations called for attention
and in fading voices exchanged Morse code.
I twisted the buttons with both hands, breaking
the waves ahead and chasing the signals.
The yellow bulb over my childhood bed
was the lighthouse I could always
come back to.
Translated by Tom Phillips
The original Bulgarian text was published in: ‘Dear Passengers‘ (2018), Izdatelstvo za poezia DA, Sofia, Bulgaria;
The English text first appeared in: Blackbox Manifold
Life is
Missed trains,
love at first sight,
coughing up the gains,
gaining the coughed-up,
singing known songs,
adding tones to new ones,
building secret
islands in the future,
working in the present,
losing the lost.
Translated by Tom Phillips
The original Bulgarian text was published in: ‘Dear Passengers‘ (2018), Izdatelstvo za poezia DA, Sofia, Bulgaria.
Hope and I
I like surprises less and less.
I don’t sense an important mission
on waking up.
I see all too easily what’s swept
behind the faces –
a little greed, great ambition,
treachery and pig-headedness.
These are all my qualities
according to the psychoanalysts.
Fine by me.
She’s small. She plays and
doesn't want to come back.
She wears a yellow frock.
I pity her a little –
she won’t grow up like other kids,
but will age down inversely
to my aging.
I’ll call her all the more quietly.
She’ll hear me all the more quietly.
My hope. I already need
to feed her.
I’m carrying a spoon.
Translated by Tom Phillips
The original Bulgarian text was published in: ‘Dear Passengers‘ (2018), Izdatelstvo za poezia DA, Sofia, Bulgaria.
Holy places in groups
I don’t know why I can’t see
the legend in the stone,
the angel, wings clasped above the altar,
beyond its expertise.
Tourists flood from the light at the entrance,
crowd around illegible slates,
winding in a queue.
The Russian women have covered their heads
with pious scarves, the Americans
are blushing beneath their baseball caps.
The Poles buy packets of incense
as gifts for home.
Everyone takes secret photographs.
Outside it smells of saffron,
kebabs, hot pita bread, unsold salad
tomatoes and cucumbers.
The candles laid out on the stall
have no price. Strawberries for ten shekels,
yarmulkes for twenty.
The rosaries are made
in Sri Lanka. The Arabs
hurry to prayers at the mosque,
closing the lokum stalls.
Kirkor Pizza awaits the hungry
from the Via Dolorosa.
The peoples of the world gather on God’s grave
only to pass by each other again
following the tour leaders’ flags.
At night the church, built
in five different ways, is locked
by a Muslim family.
The cries disappear. The wind
blows in from the desert,
sweeps up the trash of exultation.
Translated by Tom Phillips
The original Bulgarian text was published in: ‘Dear Passengers‘ (2018), Izdatelstvo za poezia DA, Sofia, Bulgaria;
The English text first appeared in: Blackbox Manifold
The Women’s Market, Sofia
1
Everyone keeps going to the market entrance,
but Khairi takes me aside to treat me
to Arabic pita bread.
I choose savoury. ‘Salaam alaikum,’ says
Khairi as he takes the snacks. The baker
nods respectfully. It means ‘peace be with you’,
I am told, but you stop thinking about the meaning
when you’ve got used to peace.
‘Where did you two get to?’ asks Niki Boykov later.
We are standing between Dubai Marquee
and Zoran’s Serbian Grill.
‘In the Iraqi bakery.’
‘I don’t think I know it. Not the Bagdadi one?’
‘No, the whole of Iraq. Just down
from the Syrian bakery.’
Travelling the world is difficult –
we can’t always do it. But in the market
it takes just a few steps.
And there you are:
some as if they’re aboard,
others as if they’re home.
2
‘The world is flat,’ writes Thomas Friedman
from the New York Times’ high tower.
But the world’s not like that in the Women’s Market,
it's as round as a peach,
as bright as a tomato, curly like kale,
hunched like the underwear seller,
dark as the woman with the potatoes.
There’s no way to see this from
The Big Apple but even here you can’t
miss it. New York written on tracksuits
hanging by the Tommy Hilfiger shirts. The clothes
are almost brands, almost festive,
pretty wearable,
the names of vague dreams
written across their chests.
Globalisation came here long ago
through the back entrance,
locked itself tight in the market
and remained unseen by the world.
The synagogue and mosque can confirm this,
but officially they don’t talk to each other.
3
A little garden in front of the monument
to Georgi Kirkov, socialist politician,
perched on by pigeons.
Bunches of leeks line up beneath
his stone gaze, children screaming around,
three young Gypsies, hair cut like Mohicans,
argue about a Facebook status, two girls
stealthily circle my bag.
Kirkov defended the poor and
the Women’s Market was named
after him for a time.
Then the women took back the name
and the poor stayed poor.
They circle his monument.
They don’t give two bucks for him.
If you’ve got two bucks, give them to the grill.
If you don’t, take them from your neighbour.
Or go on Facebook.
It’s free.
4
Socrates loved markets. They reminded him
of how many things he didn’t need.
The legless lady beggar would hardly
say the same. Do we expect her
to say anything at all?
The Tower of Babel might be a blessing.
I give the lady beggar a lev for the right
to imagine I’m good.
Translated by Tom Phillips
The original Bulgarian text was published in:
Literaturen vestnik (Literary Newspaper), 39, 27.11-3.12.2019,
Nova socialna poezia (New social poetry), 20, 2020
The English text first appeared in: