enheduanna
was
i the first one who dared put her name on a text was i the first one who
angered some heads so they erased my face from the tablets tell me oh goddess
inanna was i the first one who’d spoken in first person singular in the prayers
for escape from trials so particular: I was a princess in the first world
empire high priestess in your temple but nanna took my crown gave me a dagger
and a sword and bade me be my own judge and put an end to my shameful life
still my urge is strong and here i am at midnight speaking unto you there’s one
thing that troubles my soul i wish to know if i was the first to work with
illustrator but hush now and speak not a word we’ll wait for a mansplanation
from the omniscient narrator enheduanna
the little mermaid
breathing from the
diaphragm i’ve heard the diaphragm is a ball a perfection i think to myself the
ball is a perfect geometric figure but spread open like the map of the world in
an atlas it is said to become flat when you breathe in expanding like a
parachute it fills the chest with air the air is the fuel the energy that
creates the sound and that air needs to travel a long way when the diaphragm
tightens it draws air in when it relaxes it pushes air out of the lungs
strangely just when it relaxes in terms of singing of course it actually works
relaxed from the lungs the air travels through the trachea all the way to the
voice box speech apparatus the air under pressure pushes the vocal cords they
vibrate they open and close if they are slow and you are a man then you are
bass if they are the fastest and you are a woman soprano you are vocal cords
lip cavity nasal cavity soft and hard palate tongue mouth... you start thinking
about breathing and forget to breathe i start to think about singing and i
start to cry... when they asked the centipede how she managed with a hundred
legs she pondered the question and forgot to walk i’ve also forgotten to swim
i’ve forgotten how to breathe underwater too and i’ve forgotten what it was
like to be a child and the trick to being a child again is not never growing up
and never changing for and from love even if it is like mine unrequited but
first you need to learn to think learn to breathe properly learn many many
things and then learn how to forget it all not to think... will i ever sing
again?
the little mermaid
(suddenly the sky split from the earth brutally…)
suddenly
the sky split from the earth brutally like when an overripe watermelon bursts
open the earth bled outlining the horizon the sky was reflected in the
euphrates as in a microscope glass – sunrise I separated from all thoughts from
all the burden of myself without knowing that it had once been the king’s
command before you climb to the top to his permanent resting place with each
step up you become smaller and insignificant a crumb a grain of sand in history
and when you are at the top then you are as light as a speck of dust and only
like that you can feel its grandness you stand in silent reverence atop mount
nemrut and realize that maybe antiochus rightly regarded himself as equal to
the gods your eyes dart between their heads and their decapitated figures you
try to put them together in your mind while the sun’s head breaks from behind
the mountains and the bluegray stone shifts to the colour of a ripe peach and
when you go west you go back in time you choose to go back more than 2000 years
ago or just to the moment before sunrise because here you are greeted by the
same bluegrey heads of antiochus the sacred animals and the deities but now you
think that this is probably how you would feel if you ever set foot on the dark
side on the moon
(Translated into Engish by Daniela Spiroska)
Author’s Bionote:
*Julijana Velichkovska
(1982, Skopje, North Macedonia) is a writer, editor, translator, and poetry
festival organiser. She is the founder of the publishing house PNV Publishing,
co-founder and director of the Skopje Poetry Festival, and program director of
the Velestovo Poetry Night Festival. She is a member of the Macedonian Writers’
Association and the European poetry platform “Versopolis.” She has authored
three poetry collections: “Reißverschluss” (2024, 2nd ed. 2025), which earned
her the Miladinov Brothers Award, the highest national poetry award given by
the Struga Poetry Evenings in North Macedonia in 2025; “Open Book” (2017); and
“Mosquitoes” (2010). She also wrote the novel “Seasons” (2014, 5th ed. 2026),
and the children’s book “Vedra” (2022, 2nd ed. 2023), which won the Best Text
Award at the Litera Festival in 2023. She has also authored a monograph,
compiled anthologies, and, as a prolific translator, has translated more than
40 books into Macedonian. Her work has been translated into twenty languages.
Notable international publications include her selected poems in English:
“Expecting Lions” (Three Spires Press, Ireland, 2026), in Serbian, English and
Macedonian: “Echo”
(National Library "Stefan Prvovenčani", 2026), in Azerbaijani: “Box of Fear” (Baku,
2024),
as well as her novel “Seasons “ in Bulgarian (Sofia, 2017), and “Vedra” in
Azerbaijani (Baku, 2025). Her writing is featured in numerous national and
global anthologies, and she has performed at major literary festivals across
Europe and Asia.
(Photo
by Kristijan Ljushev)
