Nothing is Lost

Edvard Kocbek was born in 1904, the son of a church organist, in a part of present-day Slovenia that was then in Austria-Hungary. Following the publication in 1934 of his first book of poetry, he published essays that presaged the wartime alliance of this Christian Socialist with the Tito-led partisan resistance. Despite a lengthy postwar publication ban, Kocbek went on to win the Preseren Prize, Slovenia's highest literary award, in 1964. More books of both poetry and prose followed, including his "Collected Poems" in 1977, which sealed his reputation as Slovenia's greatest modern-day poet. Michael Scammell, who teaches writing in Columbia University's School of the Arts, has translated widely from Russian, Serbo-Croatian, and Slovenian, including works by Tolstoy and Nabokov. Veno Taufer, the author of sixteen volumes of poetry in his native Slovenia and the translator of more than forty books of poetry, is the recipient of the Preseren Prize and several prestigious international awards. His verse, including the collection Waterlings (Northwestern, 2000), has been translated into numerous languages.

"Edvard Kocbek is a major Slovenian poet. For the past few months, I've been carrying around and traveling with Nothing Is Lost, his selected poems eloquently translated by Michael Scammell and Veno Tauffer. This marvelous body of work spans more than 40 years and confirms that Kocbek belongs in the company of other notable East European poets... Reading [his poems] now, one feels that his pastoral sensibility and vital intimacy with nature, which at times feels mystical, were always infused with a painful sense of time, an agonized feeling of cosmic sorrow."--Edward Hirsch, Washington Post Book World

• Foreword by Charles Simic ix Acknowledgments xiii Introduction by Michael Scammell 1 From EARTH 13 Silent birds perch on my shoulders 15 The sun is wreathed in cobwebs 17 A pair of strong young oxen goes slowly 19 The women are coming from work 21 The heavy bole presses the last basket of grapes 23 O noise of waters, collapse of the universe 25 Loud greetings to you, my living comrades 27 Drunk with change I lie on the ground 29 Earth, I get everything from you 31 From DREAD 33 Rain 35 Hands 37 Moonlight 39 Moon with a Halo 41 Crucifix in a Field 43 The Game 45 After the Meeting 47 Unknown Woman 49 The Bay 51 Night Ritual 53 Midnight Wind 55 Dialectics 57 Black Sea 59 The Stick 61 Grace 63 Landscape 65 Migration 67 Things 69 Summons 71 Presentiment 73 Prayer 75 From PENTAGRAM 77 On Night Watch 79 Doubled 81 How Shall I Be? 83 Pentagram 85 The Cave 87 Image in Old Bark 89 Night Doffs Its Weapons 91 From REPORT 93 Parrots 95 Contraband 97 Exercise 99 Girl's Apron 101 Climax 103 Ditty 105 Now 107 Pontic 109 The Game Is Over 111 Play Backwards 113 Longing for Jail 115 My Partisan Name 117 Lippizaners 119 From EMBERS 125 Tree 127 What Happens to the Mountain 129 Unknown Beloved 131 The Time of the Poem 133 Blessed Search 135 From BRIDE IN BLACK 137 Amok 139 What We Were Looking For 141 The Statue 143 Tongue 145 Plea 147 Stammer, Children 149 Girl 151 On Freedom of Mind 153 Ancient Miracle 155 The Generosity of the Poem 157 Now We Are Alone 159 Game 161 I haven't done playing with words 163