Contempo- rary Slovenian poetry 2 - Ljudmila

what used to be
once a year,
when bookmarks
tumble from my books,
bearing notes like
counter ferns,
recorder carnations,
nettle clips,
I return to my village.
upon the open pages
the stories turn yellow.
they have become legends
and laid down their weapons:
the mockery, the turmoil,
the sweat of the dance
that dripped
from the dancer’s temples.
I put on my red old red pinny,
push my hair back
over my head like a bush
and wear dirty socks
and boots that would fit a man.
I smell the pork fat
in the unaired kitchens
and try out names
and their shadow-stories.
once triggered off
they crash and boom
like drifting timber.
3
at the yard entrance
I stand still,
there I have placed a stone
beside a furrow in the lime,
to remind me
of where I came from.
piran
there’s a coming and a going in the neighbouring house,
but the spindle-tree keeps me well beyond their glances.
the paths that lead from the overgrown garden
are followed only by cats, toads and snails.
loudly the sea shakes off its stinking cloak.
on my writing desk, invented characters
rehearse their missing dialogue.
I sit here, as if at the bottom of some old distress,
press air into memory cells
to keep it alive, walk in the evenings
across piazza tartini and in the morning