Poems by Shaip Emerllahu

1.
DRENICA ROAD
 
To the victims of the massacre of Drenica
 
each time
you decide to cross over
to stand all of us back up
along  Drenica Road
walking our stone names carved in air
 
even after death
            Arbëria bears our weight
 
 
Drenica: In 1998, over fifty ethnic Albanian villagers, including 11 children (from 3 to 10 years old), 11 women and 5 old people (above 70), were victims of the Serb police attack on the village of Prekaz, in the troubled Kosova region of Drenicë.
 
Arbëria is a region in the south of Italy where many Albanian communities were established during medieval times.
 
 

 
2.
THE APPLES OF TETOVA
 
 
through the concerted centuries
Tetova pruned and watered
                       its own apple trees
 
like rock salt
you’ll want to burst
when you spot them turned rotten
from maggots
 
in the end
they’ve eaten so much
                       their teeth went numb
 
 
Tetova, 1989

Translated by  by Craig Czury and Elvana Zaimi-Tufa

1.
UDHA E DRENICËS
 
viktimave të Masakrës së Drenicës
 
gjithmonë
kur jetës vendos
t’i  japësh vertikalen tënde
i bie udhës së Drenicës
 
ecja
       është lapidare
 
Arbëria preket
       edhe pas vdekjes
                      
 Tetovë, 7.III.1998
 
 
 
2.
MOLLËT E TETOVËS
 
nëpër koncerte shekujsh
i krasiste e ujiste Tetova
Mollët e veta
 
si kokë kripe
të vjen të pëlcasësh
kur i sheh tutje
si i grin dhëmbi i keq
 
fundja
hëngrën aq
sa t’u mpihen dhëmbët
 
Tetovë, 1989
 
​

Shaip Emerllahu was born on April 13th, 1962, in Trebosh, Tetova. He graduated at the Faculty of Philology in the branch of Albanian Language and Literature at Prishtina University.He got his Master at Tirana University about "The Structure of the Poetry of Azem Shkreli”. He got his PhD in Literature in Tirana.He is a lecturer at the State University of Tetova. He published the poetry books "Baptism of the Years" (1994), "Broken Project" (1997) and "Lesser Death" (2001).In 2001, the Academy Orient-Occident in Bukurest published his poetry book "Lesser Death" in Albanian and Rumanian. In 2004, the Croatian PEN and the Croatian Writers' Association published a bilingual boook with the title "Poetry" in Croatian and Albanian. In 2004, the publishing house Feniks in Skopje published a book with selected poems in Macedonian, "Dvorski son".In 2000, he published in co-operation a book with testimonies of the massacres in Kosova: "We Witness", publishing house“Ditët e Naimit” (Albanian-English).In 2009, the Italian publishing house "La stanca del poeta - 57" published his poetry book "Stracci di Vita", whereas in the same year, his poetry book "Life's Rags" was published in English.In 2014, his poetry book "Les Albanian marathon" is published in France.In Japan, Junpa Books publishes his poetry in the book "Duet of Roads" in a poetic dialogue with Taro Aizu. Cycles of his poetry were also published in Spanish, Hebrew, Arabic, Corean, Ukrainian, Hindi, Turkish, Polish, Bosnian, Macedonian etc. His poetry was included in several international anthologies. He has participated in local and international poetry festivals. He was awarded with national and international literary prizes.The Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Bulgaria granted him the high Gratitude Award "GRAMOTA" for building bridges between the Albanian and the Bulgarian culture.He was honoured in Greece for his longtime work by the UNECSO - Pireus Branch, whereas he received the golden medal "Alexander the Great" for the promotion of literature, culture and art. He worked as a journalist in national and foreign electronic and print media.For several years he was an editor of the cultural column in the daily newspaper "Flaka", Skopje. He is the founder and the director of the International Poetry Festival "Ditët e Naimit".

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