Boris Jovanovic Kastel

(Trebinje, 1971), literary critics considered it the most important Montenegrin poet Mediterranean options as well as prominent name Mediterranean poetry, has published the following books of poetry: The Scent of Regrets (1994), The Rings of Seaside (1995), Footnotes of Southern Bells (1997), The Anatomy of a Mediterranean day (1998), The Mediterranean Agenda and Predicting the Past (2000), The Mediterranean Hexateuch (2003), The Ego of Sea (2004) and Wedding with cuttle-fish (2007), Neptune s spear (selected poems in English),  Mediterranean indigo (selected poems), Lunch on the cliff (2010) as well as three books of selected essays dedicated to the Mediterranean The Parchment of Mermaid’s bust (2000),  The Fifth Side of the South (2005) and Mirroring the calm (2009).

He has won world acclaim for poetry Noside 2011th awarded under the auspices of UNESCO.

He was the editor of the literature review Ovdje and the essayist of the daily Pobjeda. Included in the anthology of world poetry Noside in Italian. His poetry was translated in to Italian, English, Czech, Polish and Slovenian, he is included in anthology of the Mediterranean love poetry from the oldest times until nowadays, in the anthologies of poetry on wine, women…

He lives in Podgorica. 

 

CONFIDENCE

 

I don't trust the sea anymore

it did not witdraw before us

to the wine bottle of the antique shop

or the aquarium of Peter the second Orseol,

nor has it without reasoning flooded us,

glittering and murmuring

it plays kolo* without a leader,

to a hundred year old circle

and bacchanals with a Lovćen fary

it lights.

 

* Montenegrin folk dance

 

THE BANNED

 

She rushed to the sun long ago

and it celebrates or burns down.

They make me forget her,

but I can't

because the sun is still rising

above the Mother of Jesus in Perast

where in the cell

surrounded by the senses of panihidas

by the stormes and turnkeys

I hear the burning of the eagle

at the carnival of merchants.

I survive by biting my nails

and I secretly drink diluted urine,

by the fish skeleton

I engrave the genealogy

of gentlemen and haiduks

of cut veins.

Excuse me the lady of Montenegro,

I read and remember you –

banned to the promise of sandy covers.

 

A GIRL FROM NAPLES

 

I followed her for a whole hour

along the streets of Naples.

I remember the market place,

the portals of the old town,

the strands without strollers.

I followed her so barefoot

with a transparent skirt and a blouse,

without a brassier

As if she sensed me,

she turned toward me,

with woman's shrewdness,

she looked at the tower.

I thought to stop her,

to introduce myself,

to tell her that I am a poet

from a country Montenegro

and without hesitation

to declare her love.

Or maybe

to give her a book,

to offer her a stroll

to the cathedral

and to wake up in the attic

of a rented apartment.

I was silent,

and lost courage

and I looked at the tower

at a minute to noon.

I didn't ask her anything

and I didn't even think of touching her

not even her shadow –

as a half of a violin –

played by a blind man

on the other side of the street.

She was leaving

as if she knew

who I was,

from which country –

where people consciously

hold their eyes closed

and blind people

feel the presentiment

of the end.

 

 

THE CLOCKS

 

The wings of schizophrenic gulls

a minute to twelve

don't show up any more.

Behind unknown, blind ships,

without the eighth passengers,

charmed by going out,

they went to no return.

The sea hot tempered in the chest.

On tops of towers and castles

decorated by God weaving the flags

at half masts, a minute to noon.

The new illusion will not come –

for a long time,

nor it will hurry when the high sea needs

the blood group of Citera, Cicero's lady

after a meal and a prostitute from the highest society –

for salvation.

Rusty of tears of angels

for a revived  and again petrified caryatid,

the mechanisms of clocks have remained.

Rusty -  for us to follow them.

 

                                                  Translated and edited

                                                                           by Vladimir Sekulić and Julka Ostojić

 

 A PALM TREE

 

In the night of the first day of summer

from a museum of the southern museums

the Neptune's spear was stolen,

a young palm tree was broken

from a tree lined path

without an end.

It is the second night of summer,

I am the witness –

a spineless and hunchback person.

 

Translated and edited

by Vladimir Sekulić