Chess Poem by Luljeta Lleshanaku

Autumn. Veins of marble
swell in the rain.

The graves of my relatives
four inches of space between them
lined up
like cars at a railroad crossing.

What once kept them together
like fingers in an ironsmith's glove
has vanished.… The war is over.

In the afterlife there are only a few strangers
waiting for the train to pass.…

The smell of the earth
reminds me of home
where a clock that once hung on the wall is missing.

I polish the dust off their names with care -
the years… like little bruises on a knee,
love… which now pricks less
than the thorns of a rose.

There, at the entrance to the cemetery
the guard sits in his booth
playing chess with himself.

Translated from Albanian: Henry Israeli