MILICA JEFTIMIJEVIĆ LILIĆ

 

 

There Would Be No Poem

 

"If it weren't for your eyes"*

I would never know

What your thoughts hide

Mysterious gestures

They wouldn't confuse me

Like unannounced storms

Or a gloomy dawn.

 

"If it weren't for your eyes"

Everything would be darker

More meaningless, predictable,

Every morning the same

The day would repeat

Like a recognizable scenography

That doesn't hint at drama

Or an unexpected outcome.

 

They brighten it up,

Everything becomes more meaningful

The day blooms like a magnolia

That the night shines in its cups

All secrets fit in them

Like your hints

Remain unspoken.

 

 "If it weren't for your eyes"

What would the twilight whisper to the night

How, dazed

by a spell of foreboding

I could go to meet the dawn

Full of mysteries, like you,

To convey to it the glow

What your eyes hide.

 

"If it weren't for your eyes"

No poem would be

More real!

 

*

"If it weren't for your eyes", Vasko Popa

 

The Illusion Is Realizing

 

Time is an illusion,

Impression is the most important illusion!

 

Does it matter what really happens

When the power of illusion is at work?

 

The scenery is skillfully assembled,

Impression is the meaning,

They serve numerous purposes

(Impression is the most important illusion)

 

Cameras record moments,

(Everything is foreseen by the synopsis)

Impression triumphs!

When they fade away, the illusion remains

It spreads through the media

And then comes to life

As if it were really happening,

Impression is multiplied,

But no one returns to what they did before!

 

Morning gives birth to new illusions!

 

Home To Myself

 

Others knew before me,

Felt, valued,

Accepted that

What I carried without knowing

Like a hidden treasure

Given by God

To multiply it,

Soul, a primordial source,

Awakened thirst

Recognized the call -

Creativity climbed.

 

Steeps, drifts, gullies

Everything stood in my way,

Instinctively I floated in the torrent,

Fought with my strength

To overcome obstacles

To stay on my path

I didn't even know about others

I was all me, my own home,

And when I fell and got up

That something inside me guided me

(Guarded me from experiencing a breakdown)

And when I sank into the deepest abyss

It pulled me out, it was a lamp

It encouraged me, (healed) me!

 

Without a trace I served

My chosen one, goodness,

Vowed to beauty

I overlooked the world's scorn

I searched for a bright face,

Divine, to strengthen

The embankment, stop

Those with evil intentions.

 

And now that I know the value

And the meaning of everyone's stumbling

I humbly observe the world

Immune to traps, tricks,

Vanity, greed of the proud,

Adored and erect

I humbly submit a verse!

 

MILICA JEFTIMIJEVIĆ LILIĆ

 

MILICA JEFTIMIJEVIĆ LILIĆ, Serbian poet, prose writer and literary critic. She is an honorary doctor of literature from the European Institute for Roma Studies, an academician of the Slavic Academy in Varna, a member of the Serbian Writers' Association, of which she was vice-president. She is the author of 35 books, poetry, prose and essays. Her books have been translated into dozens of foreign languages. She lives in Belgrade.