Albanian poet Arian Leka has joined forces with 99 other international poets to create a poem during lockdown.
Initiated by Romainian writer Ioana Morpurpo, the poem entitled ‘Airborne Particles’ is a type of prose known as a renga. This means that it’s written collaboratively with each poet adding a line before sending it on to the next contributor.
Poets from Serbia, Croatia, Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova, Turkey, the UK, the US, Greece, Singapore, and India are just some of the countries that have taken part in the project. Morpurgo emailed poets she knew and was recommended others through her network.
One by one, they added lines to the poem in English. The poets then also translated the final poem into their native language. As well as adding a line, they each made a video of them reading their line out loud, from their homes during lockdown.
The poem begins with a line from Serbian poet Milan Dobricic who focussed on solitude. Leka’s contribution is as follows:
“Profound is solitude in two glasses of wine – a ruddy horse and a white horse.
Nothing is as it seems to be, when you have it all and no one to share it with.
Soon it will rain and the doors will be shut– those inside are in, no others will make it.
Two glasses of wine, a black horse in the jug – I now have it all, but no one to share it with.”
You can read the full “Airborne Particles” poem here.
