In one of the dark corners of the room
hangs the portrait of a man
with a dagger in his hand.
He is unknown and is rarely noticed
by the visitors milling around.
The rooms grow slowly dark.
They clean the gallery and close it,
The man
jumps nimbly out of the picture –
he’s twenty seven, his clothes are dark,
a chain of gold flashes around his sinewy neck;
he goes to the window and pulls the curtain slightly apart;
he stands there all through the night
waiting motionless and open-eyed
till the first signals of approaching light.
from the book 13 Bulgarian poets, Blesok 2003