I rend, you rend.
The asparagus rains down in dashes.
The naked stem is thin.
Unclad,
deceit topples the ladder.
Do you hear the moans of the merry-go-round,
which either picks us up or brings us down.
And the asparagus
is a ladder for the ants.

-Elka Vasileva,
translated from the Bulgarian by
Katerina Stoykova-Klemer
The Season of Delicate Hunger:
Anthology of Contemporary Bulgarian Poetry
(Accents Publishing)

Elka Vasileva was born in Vratsa, in Northwestern Bulgaria. She holds a degree in philology from St. Cyril and St. Methodius University of Veliko Tarnovo, and has worked as a newspaper and radio journalist and as a community organizer and liaison for public literary events. Elka is the author of five poetry books, most recently Anatomy of Memory, published in 2012. Her poems have appeared in numerous publications. She has received various literary awards, including the Hristo Fotev Annual Poetry Award in 2005. She currently lives and writes in Bourgas.