{"id":68838,"date":"2024-04-04T16:47:56","date_gmt":"2024-04-04T14:47:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dev.acosopov.com\/%d0%be%d1%87%d0%b8\/"},"modified":"2025-03-21T10:15:12","modified_gmt":"2025-03-21T09:15:12","slug":"eyes","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.acosopov.com\/en\/reading-room\/poetry-shelf\/eyes\/","title":{"rendered":"Eyes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\n\t\tEyes\n\t<\/h1>\n\tThree days we carried you gathered in our arms,
\nin our gleaming eyes, pain and sorrow,
\nand every drop that dripped from your wound
\nfell on my heart like a bleeding ember.\nOur comrades were exhausted and hungry,
\ntheir throats burning, their shoulders hunched;
\nwith dull pain they peered into your cold eyes,
\nfearing that never would they blaze again.\nBut I knew that once more they would flare into flame
\nand beneath them our fighters would flourish and grow,
\non cold mornings they would bring warmth like the sun
\nand never would dim, never burn out.\nOn that last night in the mountain village,
\nour fighters all in tattered clothes,
\ntheir feet heavy and stinging with blisters,
\ntheir faces worried, as worn out and cold
\nas their rifles were numb and empty-
\nthere flowed like the sound of a distant river
\nfrom ear to ear a barely audible whisper:
\n“Comrade, fierce battle awaits us at dawn,
\nand we are so few-just a handful of souls.”\nWhen this news like a needle bore into your ear,
\nyour body started shaking, sorrow flashing,
\nand with eyes of storm, wide and free,
\nyou split the night with furious lightning.
\nLike that time before-you remember, dear comrade-
\nthat freezing night in early spring,
\nwhen our youth, when the very first joy we shared,
\nwas mowed down in anger by a hoarfrost of shells,
\nand with a grimace you leapt like a tigress
\ninto the black and bleeding night-
\nin an instant, with eyes spewing fire,
\nyou melted the deadly pellets of iron.\nAnd later! And later, on that last night-
\nI don’t want to think about what came next!
\nI only recall how the bleeding wound wrenched you,
\nand your whispered farewell froze on your lips,
\nbut your eyes still burned beneath your thick lashes!
\nWith their flame and a sacred oath in my breast,
\nI left with the others into the ambush.\nIn the morning, as gunpowder dusted our brows,
\nno longer were you among our number,
\nbut our fighters were seething with bitter revenge,
\nand I saw it! Oh, I saw it: when the battle began,
\nall were emboldened by your strength and valor-
\nthey were swift as deer and nimble as birds.\nAnd it was your eyes sparking with fury
\nin each of their sweaty, raging faces . . .\nThree days we carried you gathered in our arms,
\nin our gleaming eyes, pain and sorrow,
\nand every drop that dripped from your wound
\nfell on my heart like a bleeding ember.\n\tAco \u0160opov<\/a>, The Long Coming of the Fire<\/em>,<\/a> Deep Vellum, 2023.
\nTranslated from the Macedonian by Christina E. Kramer and Rawley Grau.
\nThe poem “Eyes” [“O\u010di”], first published in 1946 and later included in With Our Hands <\/em>(1950), was dedicated to \u0160opov’s Partisan comrade and first love Vera Joci\u1e31, who died after being wounded in battle.\n\t

\u0160opov reads the poem “Eyes”<\/p>\n\t