MUSIC SCHOOL STUDENT BOZANA SLAVKOVA WON THE PRESTIGIOUS POETRY CONTEST “MILIE DUELS”

With the undisputed 968 points and first place in the new ranking of the world’s largest poetry contest “Milly Duels”, Bojana Slavkova became the first Bulgarian author to win the grand prize. It was awarded to her for the poetic film “The Tree with the Obituaries”. The tape is a creative product between her, Denis Stoyanov and Denislav Marinov. “Thank you for the support and the opportunity to turn this very personal and important for me poem into a film”, wrote on her wall the talented graduate of NUMSI “Prof. Pancho Vladigerov” – Burgas In this year’s 8th edition of the competition, 711 authors from 105 countries. The initiative runs for a whole year. Bojana Slavkova deals with poetry, cinema, visual arts, theater and performance. Her education is musical – she is a flutist, she graduated from NUMSI “Prof. Pancho Vladigerov” in Burgas. She is the winner of the award named after Petya Dubarova in the seaside city. The organizer of the contest Nermin Delic himself gives the project 240 points in one of the categories. Two more Bulgarians find a place in the elite ranking. The popular poet Georgi Gavrilov occupies the fifth place, and Diana Chobanova is ranked number 24. THE TREE WITH THE OBITUARY I cannot find my counterpart in the obituaries that have merged with the tree. It’s as if by nailing the obituary multiple times, you multiply immortality, not death. It is covered dead with dead on the living tree body. Compost of memories. No one here remembers me, has not had my blood. I don’t even know who my band is. I can be anyone. My father is B and my mother is A. My father has a clot in his brain. It congealed in my brain. Why didn’t I tell him anything? Maybe we should announce the death, but why should we renew it – 40 days, 6 months, a year. Maybe we are showing that we are alive – time is running for us? No, it stopped, time froze and I’m not going anywhere. I became that tree with the obituaries fighting over who to remember. Doesn’t the tree hurt him? Doesn’t it suffocate under all this weight of stories and expectations, roles – “Loving mother, daughter and colleague”, “Good father, devoted employee, kind son”, predictions, embellishments, nonsense and kitsch. Death is kitsch. Can’t we just become dust or dust? Leave me alone! I want you to scatter me after my death, so that I can dance in the wind and not be anyone’s clot or tree.