TANJA PROKOPLJEVIĆ

 

The Power Of Flight

 

In the time of summer

When the cricket sigh in the field.

When the heat spreads across the cheeks.

When the birds sway in the sky,

And when the sea offers its fragrant hand.

The poet wants to put flight into his poem.

 

While the pale paper smiles at the poet,

He commands the bird

To climb into the feather.

To spread its wings around the paper

And to put its strength into song.

 

Shortly, the bird lets out a cry and says:

"Poet, lift your head up,

Look at my brothers and sisters

Gliding across the sky.

May your feather be filled in the summer

While you hang out with us."

And the poem is made.

Now you too poem lovers can

Wander with the birds

Because the power of flight

Is in the love we create for others.

 

The Time Of Silence

 

There are those of us

Who hear

The sounds of silence

That summer's defiance –

The airy canopy

Full of swelling day.

 

There are those of us who hear

The sound of wings,

When a bird soars

To those unreal expanses.

 

And while we are silent about all that.

While we spread our hands to nature,

We hear and this human silence,

A lawless silence full of torment.

 

I Am A Bird 

 

I am a bird

With wide wings

And a red beak

My body touches the clouds.  I am faster than other birds.

I was seen around the desert and the ocean.

Furthermore, I flew around the glaciers

And touched the mountain fairies.

 

I am a bird,

The freest of all birds.

I ran away from the canvas.

Likewise, I am wild.

Outwitted the eagle and made the falcon laugh.

 

I am a bird,

Of the most beautiful colors and delicate feathers,

With a refined taste.

I'm grieving.

Hey, I grieve for love.

Help me.

In his eye I saw

The sun and comets unseen.

In his touch I recognized the twinkling of the soul,

And in his smile a lifted heart.

I give freedom for that love.

Take away my wings!

Please.

For the sake of our embrace.

Because a bird cannot hug

while flying somewhere high.

Copyright©Tanja Prokopljević

 

Translated By Tanja Prokopljević

 

TANJA PROKOPLJEVIĆ

 

TANJA PROKOPLJEVIĆ was born on August 22. 1971 in Zemun (Serbia). She acquired primary and secondary education in her hometown, and higher education in tourism in New Belgrade. She studied English in America. After returning from America (1995), she was successful in journalism until 2001. Then she started publishing. She worked as a director and editor in the publishing company "Estart", but also for other publishing houses. She published her first book, a collection of newspaper articles, in 2002. She is the author of eleven collections of poems, essays on movements in contemporary art, two novels and novels of documentary prose, and concluding with this year 2021, two books of stories and collections of literary criticism.