Marcello Potocco

Marcello Potocco (1974, Ljubljana) has so far issued four poetry collections: Lila (Mondena, 2002), Pripovedi o ovcah, ljudeh in drugih živalih (Narratives of the sheep, people and other animals; LUD Literatura, 2005), Popravki pesniške zbirke (Corrections of the poetry collection; LUD Literatura, 2007) and Via Francigena (LUD Literatura, 2011). For the last two books he was shortlisted for the Veronika and for the Jenko Price respectively. His poems have appeared in Serbian, Croatian, English, Czech, Polish, Macedonian, Italian and several other translations. He has taken part of various Slovene and foreign festivals, e.g. Goranovo proljeće (Croatia), Dnevi poezije in vina (Days of Poetry and Wine, Slovenia), Karamanovi days (Macedonia), Residenze estive (Italy). He is a member of the Slovenian Writers Association. In 2006 he received his Ph.D. degree in Comparative Literature. Since 2007 he teaches Literary Theory, World Literature, Contemporary Slovene Literature and Creative Writing at the University of Littoral, Koper (Slovenia).

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duchesse anne

The city is shoving off. The lights are
moving away, until they finally
shrink into a single misty strip. Then also
the strip vanishes. This sharp white
light remains, which illuminates the joints of iron,
the smell of petrol. People who sink
into sleep. We are on a ship. We sail
through complete dark. We sail in the dark,
which cannot avoid us,
through the blackness, which is doomed to us as if
part of the ticket, for which we paid in port.
An autopilot is driving us, the captain and the crew
are here only to check the beginning
and the final manoeuvre. They also
sleep at night.

They also,
like the passengers, dream confident
that this is a route of the expected. We dream
that in the morning we will cut our way out
untouched. Exhausted by untouchingness.

Translated by MP