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