Winter
From today my spirit is a recluse,
And banished is all my joy.
Long has it been that snow has lain
Over mountain and over wood.
Snowflakes come drifting one by one
Down upon the deserted village
And, shivering beneath the snow,
Earth slumbers, buried once again.
Slowly my spirit too sinks to the ground
In mourning, falling like a leaf.
Nary a soul is to be heard,
No people, no sign of life.
In such peace and tranquillity
I hear a bird lament,
Letting out a faint sigh,
Frightened to leave this life.
[Dimër, from the volume Vdekja e nositit, Prishtina: Rilindja 1986, p. 84, translated from the Albanian by Robert Elsie, and first published in English in An elusive eagle soars, anthology of modern Albanian poetry, London: Forest Books 1993, p. 5]
