The Shape

De: Dejan Stojanovic

Narrado por: Virtual Voice

POETRY IN TRANSLATION

The Shape (Oblik, 2000) is a collection of poetry by the Serbian-American poet Dejan Stojanović (1959). The book contains 46 poems in six sequences: "Home of the Shape," "Happiness of Atoms," "Bells," "Pit of the Stone," "Wonders," and "Big Chamber."

The primordial existence of the shape, summed up in Dejan Stojanović's poems, does not rest on historical and mythical tradition. However, it indirectly relies on it. The poem is deeply plunged into the darkness of the primordial form and its countless allotropic forms depicted in the natural cycle. It establishes a relationship between one's formative power and perception of the outlines and boundaries of the world—space and time, a unique and absolute being, the beginning and end of the world.
– Petar V. Arbutina

CONCISE AND CLEAN LANGUAGE

Philosophical reminiscences prevail in the book The Shape. The basic motif throughout the book is shape, from atoms to stars. It must be admitted that writing about such an abstract concept takes work. Affirmation of life and creativity is dominant in the world. "I am the form that creates forms / To create means to live" ("The Life of Forms"). In the poem "Glow," there is praise for the form: "If you understood my brilliance / You would shine, too." In a quiet voice, the poet admonishes those who are deaf to the brilliance: "I only speak in silence // If I really spoke / You would become speechless" ("Return from a Dream"). The movement is, "I've passed through everything / Although, I've never been anywhere // I sleep in the smallest and the biggest / Although I stay in the same place // Wherever I go / I run into myself," from the poem of the same name.

Hate stands on the other side. The poet, naturally, opts for love but also understands the one who hates: "Nothing happens / Nothing disappears" ("Big room"). A distant shape, in spite of huge distance, can be heard. In the book The Shape, Stojanović expressed a high degree of philosophical understanding of things and phenomena, abstract above all, and presented himself as a great poet.
– Draginja Urošević
Borba, 2001