Martin Camaj (Albania)
1925-1992
Martin Camaj was born in Temali in the Dukagjin region of the northern Albanian alps. He is an émigré writer of significance both for Albanian literature and for Albanian scholarship. He received a classical education at the Jesuit Saverian college in Shkodër and studied at the University of Belgrade. From there he went on to do postgraduate research in Italy, where he taught Albanian and finished his studies in linguistics at the University of Rome in 1960. From 1970 to 1990 he served as professor of Albanian studies at the University of Munich and lived in the mountain village of Lenggries in Upper Bavaria until his death on 12 March 1992. Camaj's academic research has concentrated on the Albanian language and its dialects, in particular those of southern Italy.
Camaj's mature verse reflects the influence of the hermetic movement of Italian poet Giuseppe Ungaretti (1888-1970). The metaphoric and symbolic character of his language increases with time as does the range of his poetic themes. A selection of his poetry has been translated into English by Leonard Fox in the volumes Selected Poetry, New York 1990, and Palimpsest, Munich & New York 1991.
-Robert Elsie
BOOKS OF POETRY
Nji fyell ndë male (Prishtinë: 1953); Kanga e vërrinit (Prishtinë: 1954); Lirika mes dy moteve (Munich: 1967); Njeriu më vete e me tjerë (Munich: 1978); Dranja (Munich: 1981); Poezi (1953-1967) (Munich: 1981).
POEMS IN ENGLISH TRANSLATION
Selected Poems, trans. by Leonard Fox (New York: New York University Press, 1990); Palimpsest(Munich and New York, 1991)
My Land
When I die, may I turn into grass
On my mountains in spring,
In autumn I will turn to seed.
When I die, may I turn into water,
My misty breath
Will fall onto the meadows as rain.
When I die, may I turn into stone,
On the confines of my land
May I be a landmark.
—Translated from the Albanian by Robert Elsie
(from Lirika midis dy moteve, 1967)
Moutain Feast
Blood was avenged today.
Two bullets felled a man.
Blood was avenged today.
Under the axe-head
The ox's skull bursts by the stream.
(Today there will be great feasting!)
Blood was avenged today.
The wailing of men gone wild
Mingles with the smell of meat on the fires.
And the autumn foliage falls
Scorched on the white caps
At the tables, outside.
Night. At the graves on the hill
Fresh earth, new moon.
The wolves have descended from the mountains
And drink blood at the stream.
—Translated from the Albanian by Robert Elsie
(from Lirika midis dy moteve, 1967)
A Bird Languishes
The Canon of Birds says:
Every bird shall stretch its wings and perish on the grass,
Punishment for having plied the forbidden border
Between heaven and earth.
A bird languishes upon the lawn, at death's door,
The leaves in the trees are
Unreachable birds and companions
Frolicking in the sunlight.
In the distance are two millstones pounding
At one another, as is their wont,
Silently.
—Translated from the Albanian by Robert Elsie
(from Njeriu më vete e me tjerë, 1978)
Death - Crackling
Death - the crackling
Of a dry leaf,
Wait for me at the end of the earth
With no chrysanthemum in your hand.
Wait, benumbed swallow,
With wings o'er the waves, for my breath
To soar to the heavens,
Feathered like a white raven.
—Translated from the Albanian by Robert Elsie
(from Njeriu më vete e me tjerë, 1978)
Unexpected Guest in Berisha
When the guest entered the house at dusk,
Seven brothers looked askance
As if he were walking over their heads and not
Over the dry floorboards.
Nor did they, as ancient custom demands,
Greet and speak with him, but stared at the ground.
The youngest of them broke the silence,
Removed the lahuta from its place
And laid it in the guest's lap for him to play.
When he held the lute's body,
Gently stroking its side
With his rough fingers,
And plucked its foal-hair string with his thumb,
The brothers and the old man, head of the household,
Understood that the stranger was a singer
Like no other among them.
The beginning holds the heart in sway,
Not the end of the song.
—Translated from the Albanian by Robert Elsie
(from Njeriu më vete e me tjerë, 1978)
To a modern poet
Your road is good:
The Parcae are the ugliest faces
Of classical myths. You did not write of them,
But of stone slabs and of human brows
Covered in wrinkles, and of love.
Your verses are to be read in silence
And not before the microphone
Like those of other poets,
The heart
Though under seven layers of skin
Is ice,
Ice
Though under seven layers of skin.
—Translated from the Albanian by Robert Elsie
(from Njeriu më vete e me tjerë, 1978)
The Old Deer
The shepherds abandoned the alpine pastures
For the warmth of the lowland valleys,
Sauntering down the trails, talking loudly
About women and laughing
Beside the water of the stream bubbling forth
From well to well.
The old deer raised its head from the scorched earth
And observed the pale foliage. Then
It departed to join its sons,
They too with their minds on the does.
Broken, it too abandoned the alpine pastures and followed
The merry murmur of the stream below, a fiery arrow,
The wanderer in search of warmer pastures and winter grass
Which it will never touch!
When they slew it, the shepherds pried its eyes open
And saw in the pupils
The reflection of many deer drinking water from the stream.
—Translated from the Albanian by Robert Elsie
(from Njeriu më vete e me tjerë, 1978)
Fragile Land
(To the tribes below the Drin)
Between Molç Mountain and Qerret
There opens a gorge leading down to the river,
Formed as if it had been a lake,
And we were out there alone, on it, still,
In dugouts of maple.
We used to know by heart
The names of choice fish and not
Of preying birds and wild
Foliage.
Even the sheen in our eyes
Would be blue and not black.
We would float in the water
Not in the clouds.
—Translated from the Albanian by Robert Elsie
(from Njeriu më vete e me tjerë, 1978)