Katerina Stoykova-Klemer interviewed poet and graphic designer Ivo Rafailov for The Season of Delicate Hunger: Anthology of Contemporary Bulgarian Poetry. Here is a translation of that conversation.
What would you like for the American readers to know about Bulgarian poetry?
That it’s tenaciously working on its semantic threads.
What would you like for the American readers to know about you personally?
That I’m working on mine, as well. :)
Is there an American poet who has influenced you or has made an impression on you? How do you interact with American poetry?
Oh, of course. At the beginning, Williams, Pound and Cummings strongly influenced me. Later I “discovered” Frost, Lowell, Kooser, Strand… I read more in translation in Bulgarian, but also in the original. I order the books of poets who have made an impression on me.
Letter
I hang out,
smoke and drink coffee
before I shower.On the white curtain
in the window
a giant fly makes me
look at it again.You know how the nearsighted
use just one eye
when they want to see something.I draw near the left profile
carefully, very carefully.And then I see—these are
two coupled flies—
one has penetrated the other,
perfectly still,
unfazed,
no shudder of a wing,
tentacles grasping the tissue.Three hours later
they haven’t moved.I smoke and watch—
one body,
one position.Can you
be satisfied
with just this?They annoy me,
I blow smoke on them,
knock on the glass.I will kill them,
I will kill them.I can’t do that.
-Ivo Rafailov,
translated from Bulgarian by
Katerina Stoykova-Klemer
What forms of cultural exchange between Bulgaria and the U.S. would you find interesting, practical and helpful?
The translation of this anthology is an exceedingly wonderful example. Curiosity protects from stupidity.
What do you wish for the anthology and its readers?
Restless bookish hours.
Ivo Rafailov was born on February 25th, 1977 in Bourgas. He holds a degree in cultural studies from St. Kliment Ohridski University in Sofia. He works as a graphic designer. Ivo is the author of two books of poetry, most recently Countable Temptations (2013), and he has received awards for both photography and poetry. Ivo is the co-founder of Frost Press, which has published collections of contemporary American poets in Bulgarian, including Billy Collins, Ted Kooser and Carl Dennis. He lives and works in Sofia.
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