Sejfulla Malëshova

Sejfulla Malëshova Poems

Sejfulla Malëshova Biography

Sejfulla Malëshova (born March 2, 1900, in Këlcyrë; died June 9, 1971 in Fier) was an Albanian politician and writer. In 1924, a 23 years old Malëshova was Fan Noli's personal secretary. He held that position after having studied some medicine in Italy. After Noli's government was overthrown, Malëshova fled to Paris and then to Moscow, where he studied and then taught Marxism. In 1930-1932 he joined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, but was subsequently expelled as a Bukharinist. He became a charter member of the Albanian Communist Party and a member of its Politburo prior until 1946. He used to appear as a self-proclaimed rebel poet of the guerrilla war against the Italian and German occupying armies in Albania, and became known by his pen name Lame Kodra. In 1945, he was appointed Minister of Culture and Propaganda. In the same year, he was elected president of the newly founded Albanian League of Writers and Artists, which consisted of seventy-four members initially, with several non-communist intellectuals among them. The League took over the publication of well-known Albanian literature Drita magazine. Malëshova had emerged as a moderate communist, often inviting publications without regard to their ideological content, which brought him the wrath of Enver Hoxha, particularly after an appeal by the Writers League to Harry Truman and Clement Attlee for Western recognition of Albania. In 1946, Hoxha accused Malëshova of "rightist deviation" and expelled him from the communist party. Following his dismissal, a persecution against the writers ensued, many of whom were harassed and imprisoned by the communist authorities. Malëshova spent the rest of his life as a warehouseman in Fier, shunned by almost all fellow citizens. If anyone dared speak to him, he would pinch his lips with his fingers, to remind the vow of eternal silence which would ensure his survival. He died an outcast in 1971. His funeral was attended only by his sister, the gravedigger and two Sigurimi agents.)

The Best Poem Of Sejfulla Malëshova

How I Love Albania

I've no farm estates or manors,
I've no shops or lofty buildings,
Yet I love my land, Albania -
For a barn in Trebeshina,
For its boulders and its brushwood,
For a hut above Selishta,
For two fields ploughed in Zallishta,
For a cow and for a donkey,
For an ox, a little lambkin,
This is how I love my country
Like a shepherd, like a peasant.

Yes, I love my land, Albania,
For the clover in its meadows,
For a quick and agile maiden,
For its spring of water gurgling
From the cliffs and flowing swiftly
Through the leafy oak tree forests,
Tumbling down to form a river,
Yes, I love my land, Albania,
For the fenugreek in blossom,
For the birds that fly above it,
For the nightingales a-singing,
In the shade and in the brambles,
Trilling songs of love and longing,
This is how I love my country,
Like a poet in devotion.

Yes, I love my land, Albania,
Right from Korça to Vranina,
Where the farmer sets off early
With his hoe and plough a-toiling,
Sows and reaps by sun and moonlight,
Yet, he has no food to live on,
Where the farrier and saddler
Day and night stoop o'er their duties
Just to get a few stale breadcrumbs,
Where the porter at the dockyards,
Laden down with iron and barrels,
Bears his load, barefoot and ragged,
Always serving other people.
Yes, I love my land, Albania,
Right from Skopje to Janina,
Where its people in misfortune
Suffer, live their lives in serfdom,
Yet they have a fighting spirit -
This is how I love my country,
Like a revolutionary.

(1939)

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