This new publication of the Albanian-American poet, Sami Gjoka is a mournful piece of identity that captures everyone's heart and mind.
"Life Has Frozen In Albania" is absolutely touching, amazing and heart wrenching collection of the finest written words; a battle ground between the demons of the dark forces and the divine celestial energy, inside every human shell: "From where we leave departing / to claim the whole universe", (Empty Bags That Fill the Sky), an attempt to make this planet, plagued by greed, and hatred, where humans will pass by; "Not to sleep and not to rest / But to bleed, and scream, and cry / Cursed / But never, never blessed", a better place for the angels to be born, or: "For as long as this world / Is not bettered, has not changed / It must be a cruelty / Selfish, silly and sinister / To bring angels from the sky / To make earthly little sisters". (Angels Not Yet Borne).
The verses within this compilation will inspire readers and provide peace for those who mourn their loses, acceptance for the truth of who they are - and understanding of their ultimate destiny.
Through amazing depiction of feelings, the tender poems about gentle passing in: "Life Has Frozen In Albania" will definitely make everything easier to understand.
This book is Available for sale on all the major online bookstores.
About the Author
Born in 1962 in Albania, Gjoka fled his native country and was arrested for border violation in 1990 by the Yugoslavian army and then was sent to a Macedonian prison, in the city of Ohrid. There he would suffer daily physical and mental tortures, with the pretext of finding from him if he was an Albanian spy or just a refugee, but in reality, says Gjoka, he was tortured purely for the fact that he was Albanian, and as a result of the medieval hatred that Balkan dwellers have for each other.
After the fall of communism in Albania, which was marked by an outbreak of the embassies in Tirana, Gjoka was soon released from the Macedonian jail and was sent to a refugee camp in Padinska Skela, in Belgrade. Interviewed by the U.S. Embassy there, he won the right to political asylum.
In 1996 Gjoka becomes a U.S. citizen.
In America, Gjoka would build a successful real estate company, but he never would lose his passion to write.
Gjoka has been continuously active in supporting the rights of his countryman, scattered in different parts of the Balkan states.
During the Kosova war, Gjoka's essays, called upon the U.S. government to intervene in order to stop Kosova from becoming another Srebrenica. In his writings, Gjoka would caution, that sooner or later, the United States would be drown into the conflict, if not for the interest of the Albanians, for its own interest, stating that the Serbian advances toward the Adriatic Sea was not only an Albanian catastrophe but a western misfortune, as well, for it represented a Slavic expanding influence at the gates of the western Europe, while NATO was aiming to reach farther east, toward Russia.
Given that such involvement in the conflict was inevitable for America, Gjoka would argue that it better be soon, before the faith and the hope of the Albanians shifts, out of the desperation to survive, elsewhere, to regions and countries not so pleasant for our strategic calculations.
As a poet, Gjoka remains distant from any influence of political organization or parties, both here and in his native Albania.
Poems in this book are more or less a reflection of the author's life experiences.
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