Temur Chkhetiani’s poems always have a sort of calm mood, the mood of a person who is free of everyday turmoil, who is firmly based in his own solitude, from where he contemplates events taking place in the world. He not only contemplates, but is himself contemplated in some poems. As in his earlier collections, there is often an autobiographical element in this collection, too, and this creates the poem’s narrative, creates its mood and then, if one can say so, manipulates these moods, so as to give birth to the poetic message, the phrase, the metaphor in a dynamic way. What is important is that this is not done by external effects, nor that it is autobiographical in a seething, everyday way: this is an existence in which what is close and what are important changes occur only rarely, or do not, in fact, occur at all. But precisely because every new nuance, which enters the monotonous flow of life externally, takes on a colouring and a sharpness and is transformed into poetic material, is ‘reworked’. TemurChkhetiani’s poetic experiments are never sentimental in a moving or a tiresome way. Nowhere will you come across any excitement which is decorative or self-centred, nor any ‘flirtation’ or worn-out metaphors. TemurChkhetiani’s poetic personae are unexpected to the point of paradoxical and full of sparks; they depend on their own artistic function and affect us as an organic part of a whole artistic tissue. It should be noted that TemurChkhetiani is one of the most interesting contemporary Georgian minimalist poets. He works systematically in this genre and in this book, too, we find interesting examples of minimalist poetry.

‘His poems are chronicles of ‘low states’, of loss and loneliness, and the poet often describes the process, too, of creating these ‘chronicles’. MalkhazKharbedia, writer, critic. In my opinion, the main thing in his poetry is an unusual fusion of the hermetic and the open, of release. On one hand, the atmosphere seems to be a closed book, to be bounded, introverted; on the other hand, he is totally open to everything, to life, to the world. The confessional style comes from the hermetic side, but this is not the typical confessional tone found in poetry. The fusion of practically contrasting and differentiated discourses creates a special and unusual style.’   

Nugzar Zazanashvili, poet, critic

‘Temur Chkhetiani is a compiler of chess puzzles at a very high level. And if someone can devise chess puzzles in such a way that there is only one correct way to win, then he will have no difficulty in creating poetic compositions either. It is from this aspect that TemurChkhetiani’s poetry is interesting: it assembles what it has to say by composition. It does so laconically and conducts things precisely towards what needs to be expressed, to where the poem needs to be.’   

Shota Iatashvili, poet, critic

EXTRACT
Translated into English by Lyn Coffin and Giorgi Tavartkiladze 

THE WAVE

there were countless before me,
a lot will come after me.

but this moment is mine
and I'm running with open arms.

I want to embrace you, shore.
and in embracing you
disappear.


EXTRACT
Translated into English by Dalila Gogia 

WOMAN AT THE TABLE  

Step away from the window,
Turn around,
Look around…
...
Pick up dead butterflies
From the floor,
From the table -
Collect them in the ashtray, watch sometime,
Watch, till you come to your senses.

Then take the ashtray out
And empty it into the dust bin.
The bin will stay on the garbage disposal of course
And finally, when comes along,
The garbage truck will take everything away.
Everything,
Including that evening.

You two were sitting at the table
Under the candlelight
Smiling at each other
With sparkle in your eyes,
While butterflies,
Excited,
Flying over you,
Could not feel
Getting their wings
Singed.


THREE DREAMS AND ONE REALITY 

Dream 1
...
She was leaving,
And you were seeing’ her off to the train
And she, already on the carriage,
Was talking to you with a smile out of the open window.
You seemed to hear the words then,
But as it proved later, you could not keep those words in mind.
Then you waved to each other
And the train left together with the dream.

Dream 2

Somewhere in the passages
You were walking shoulder to shoulder,
The passages were quite narrow
And you two were touching each other with shoulders
And you could distinctively feel parfume of her hair…
She entered the room first
You – after some hesitation,
In the room people were sitting around the tables
With books and cups on them.
You looked, but could not recognize any of those people.
She was not there at all.

Dream 3

In café you were sitting at at the table waiting for her
A quiet melody was playing
There were many empty seats
...It seemed sunny outside, sunny and crowded.
You were sitting
Occasionally looking at the door.
Finally she entered
Looked around…
It was her
But…
Not her.
In just a second
She estranged, changed into someone else,
And you,
Staring at her in astonishment
Felt your heart broken
And
Turned back.

Reality

You are alone in the cold room standing by the wall.
It is raining and the rain does not let you out.
And you have no idea, where you are from, from which dream,
And what you want right now you don’t know either.
You can just feel a lump in your throat
And you try to help
Yourself from crying.



***  

Nah sind wir, Herr
Paul Celan

I know – you are close.
Close. and I feel that way.
Your name - like air, around me.
Your name I slip occasionally even aloud,
I catch myself slip. and I thrill – the air suddenly starts waving.

I know – you are close.
But
What is my thought or breathe for you?
Or my thrill?
I know – you are close.
But
Still remember my name?

You,
Who’s always been a wish
And never an answer?



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