Maja Milojković was born in Zaječar and divides her life between Serbia and Denmark. In Serbia, she serves as the deputy editor-in-chief at the publishing house Sfairos in Belgrade.She is also the founder and vice president of the Rtanj and Mesečev Poets’ Circle, which counts 800 members, and the editor-in-chief of the international e-magazine Area Felix, a bilingual Serbian-English publication. She writes literary reviews, and as a poet, she is represented in numerous domestic and international literary magazines, anthologies, and electronic media. Some of her poems are also available on the YouTube platform. Maja Milojković has won many international awards. She is an active member of various associations and organizations advocating for peace in the world, animal protection, and the fight against racism. She is the author of two books: Mesečev krug (Moon Circle) and Drveće Želje (Trees of Desire). She is one of the founders of the first mixed-gender club Area Felix from Zaječar, Serbia, and is currently a member of the same club. She is a member of the literary club Zlatno Pero from Knjaževac, and the association of writers and artists Gorski Vidici from Podgorica, Montenegro.
I think of all artists who speak of their work of art,
and the brushes behind it.
But I’ll never get to show my work of art.
I’ll simply give my last breath to regret,
regret for the person I was.
Each time I sink into melancholic thoughts,
each time the thread of fate pulls me into the abyss,
into the deep sea,
with tides crashing against me as I drown,
my hand silently reaches out…
but I only sink.
And I will drown,
drown without ever being a valued, loved, important, or useful person. I say goodbye to the only ones who ever welcomed me with warmth, even though I don’t deserve it.
God, just take me.
The wounds on my body and under my nails burn.
Please let everything heal from me.
And may tears of fury have served some purpose.
Now, yes, this note is a great work of art,
But one with a bitter, sorrowful ending.
Goodbye.
As I touch the bottom of the sea.
Self-portrait poem from my bitter heart
Like an unopened chest,
I stayed with the deep intrigue of what else is inside of my deep eyes.
Like calm tides,
I transform into a great wave, full of all my regrets.
Like the meow of a baby cat,
I shelter for the protection of my parents while naked from the world I am.
Look at the free and rebellious wind
What I want to be, while I witness the world counting all the stars.
The trunk in the middle of my heart
Prevents water from passing through me.
While I wait for the distant dawn,
I become a sea of tears with my deep darkness.
My inner demon is anger
the anger that only calms the salt.
I am a rainbow of emotions,
and a roller coaster.
I am a survivor of the world,
and a raised soldier.
And with my wounded hands,
I open the doors of my future and the doors of my heart.
Where my feet and head really are
They say I don’t know
where my feet and head are, that I’m always daydreaming.
But if only they knew
that my dream is the real world.
The sky is always bright,
Filled with clear, open clouds.
Flowers have no color,
only an origin
that makes them slightly different. The rain is sweet.
Old Europeans often buy classic, rather dubious-looking blazers, shirts and shoes at flea markets. But you can’t buy the past, just like you can’t buy flexibility.
***
I don’t have a single HIV-positive friend. European statistics say otherwise. I don’t have a single gay friend. The number of users on dating apps says that this is mathematically unlikely. I don’t have any friends. I don’t even have myself. And I actually don’t have any data.
***
Your family gives you to me like pneumonia. I have never loved either you or myself. If I were Shakespeare and wrote about our life, I would have hanged myself long ago.
And the voice of the question when it emerged from fear.
In the hand of the first human, it became a tool that holds life,
A spark that lights the darkness,
A ember that preserves the body from the cold of annihilation,
And the first line on the cave wall.
It was a home when a home was unknown,
A sky to seek shade beneath,
A ground that bears the tremor of a step,
And a language that speaks without letters.
From it the story was launched,
Upon it the cry was broken,
In its hollows the trace dwelled,
And through it, humans understood the meaning of being.
In all its transformations, it bore witness,
In the grave, a mark,
In the temple, a symbol,
In the crown, glory,
And in sculpture, immortality.
O you,
Silent one who thinks,
Heavy one who speaks with wisdom,
Secret one dwelling at the edge of time.
I AM NOT AN IDOL
I am not an idol,
nor a silent wall where your voice hides when it fears the void.
I am the breath of the universe when its chest feels tight,
and I am the wound that refuses to become a scar.
I am woman,
not a shadow that follows you wherever you walk,
nor a mirror that polishes your face to see your own glow in it,
but another face of truth,
questioning you when you long for forgetfulness.
I am not a stone that adorns your throne,
I am a wave uprooting silence from its roots,
and a land returning to the seed the whisper of eternity.
You want me as a chain,
but I want you as a journey,
searching with me for a meaning beyond flesh and blood.
I am not an idol,
I am a question dwelling in your eyes,
and an answer written only with the freedom of the soul.
I am woman,
and if you understood me…
if you stood before me without fear and without dominion,
you too would become… human.
A TEST FOR CONSCIENCE
In the silence of closed homes
The stone bleeds from the heat of bodies,
And the gaze of shadows trembles in the corners of the soul,
As if time itself fears to witness.
The hand that strikes is but an echo,
An echo hiding in the hollows of the heart,
And a letter lost amidst the silence of screams,
A soul learning to live without a voice.
In every wound, a river of questions is born,
And in every tear, the philosophy of existence takes shape:
Is freedom merely a distant dream,
Or a secret hidden in the depths of anguish?
The woman is not merely moving silence,
Nor a stone dwelling between walls,
She is a light slipping through the cracks of pain,
A river flowing despite the chains,
And wisdom that cannot be broken by the striking hand.
Every fracture teaches the stone to dream,
Every tear gives the shadow new colors,
Silence becomes a cry,
Pain opens gates to light,
And resilience births a new horizon for life.
Violence against women is a test of life,
An experiment of human awareness,
A test for conscience,
And where the soul endures,
Light springs from the depths of the stone,
And dignity learns it cannot be killed,
Silence becomes strength,
And freedom echoes in every heart that remained silent,
Until the world understands that true power
Lies in respect, and in enabling the soul
To bloom without limits.
BRIEF BIOGRAPHY:
TAGHRID BOU MERHI is a Lebanese-Brazilian poet, journalist, and translator, whose writing carries echoes of multiple cultures and resonates with a deeply human spirit. Born in Lebanon, she currently lives in Foz do Iguaçu, Brazil, after spending significant periods in various countries, including eight years in Italy and two in Switzerland, where she absorbed the richness of European culture, adding a universal and humanistic dimension to her Arab heritage.
Taghrid writes poetry, prose, articles, stories, and studies in the fields of thought, society, and religion, and is fluent in six languages: Arabic, English, French, Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish. This allows her to move between languages and cultures with the lightness of a butterfly and the depth of a philosopher. Her works are distinguished by a clear poetic imprint even in the most complex subjects, combining aesthetic sensitivity with a reflective vision of existence.
To date, she has published 23 original books and translated 45 works from various languages into Arabic and vice versa. She has contributed to more than 220 Arabic and international anthologies, and her works have been translated into 48 languages, reflecting the global reach of her poetic and humanistic voice.
Taghrid serves as the head of translation departments in more than ten Arabic and international magazines, and she is a key figure in bringing Arabic literature to the world and vice versa, with a poetic sensitivity that preserves the spirit and authenticity of the text.
She is renowned for her refined translations, which carry poetry from one language to another as if rewriting it, earning the trust of leading poets worldwide by translating their works into Arabic, while also bringing Arabic poetry to the world’s languages with beauty and soul equal to the original.
She is also president of Ciesart Lebanon, holds honorary literary positions in international cultural organizations, serves as an international judge in poetry competitions, and actively participates in global literary and cultural festivals. She has received dozens of awards for translation and literary creativity and is today considered one of the most prominent female figures in Arabic literature in the diaspora.
Her passion for writing began at the age of ten, and her first poem was published at the age of twelve in the Lebanese magazine Al-Hurriya, titled The Cause, dedicated to Palestine. Since then, writing has become an inevitable existential path for her, transforming her into a flower of the East that has spread its fragrance in the gardens of the world.
I was disturbed by this phone call in the last month.
RAIN IN MY EYES
The rainbow appeared
behind the lines of rain,
the worries and troubles of stis,
carved verses
where the west burned,
in the braided flower,
we put a wreath.
You can’t see the rainbow
it didn’t rain a little,
in my eyes…!
METAMORPHOSIS
(Loraa of New York)
Loraa asked me to imitate Odysseus,
not to listen
sirens of the deep,
nor the poet’s erotic verses
in the rocky waves of the sea.
In New York he studied Pythagoras,
the language of mimicry read the unspoken word
wrote it in saltiness,
where life is a dream
and the dream becomes life.
The epic words underwent a metamorphosis,
the seagulls danced
over our heads,
deep sea conception
shivers run through,
air in New York
I missed the thrill of life.
Lan Qyqalla is an Albanian writer, editor-in-chief of the EliteOrfeu International Magazine, winner of several national and international literary awards, member of the Albanian-American Academy of Sciences and Arts in New York, and Director of the International Poetic Festival “Poetic, Literary and Artistic Heritage in Kosovo” for 17 editions, and Professor at the Gymnasium in Pristina. The poet from Kosovo has published more than 67 works (poems and stories) in languages including Albanian, Romanian, Francophone, Swedish, English, Polish, Arabic, Hindi, and Mandarin. Some of his poems have been translated and published in several languages and in several magazines and literary portals. Qyqalla lives and creates in Pristina.
Mirta Liliana Ramírez has been a poet and writer since she was 12 years old. She has been a Cultural Manager for more than 35 years. Creator and Director of the Groups of Writers and Artists: Together for the Letters, Artescritores, MultiArt, JPL world youth, Together for the letters Uzbekistan 1 and 2. She firmly defends that culture is the key to unite all the countries of the world. She works only with his own, free and integrating projects at a world cultural level. She has created the Cultural Movement with Rastrillaje Cultural and Forming the New Cultural Belts at the local level and also from Argentina to the world.
