OTHERS ABOUT ZRINKO

ENES KIŠEVIĆ

THE BLUE BUTTERFLY

 

There is a silence that is fruitful, which words can only disturb. Then there is a silence that needs a touch every now and then as a seal and a word as a stamp of love. That kind of silence is called love. Unfortunately, there is also a silence filled with gunpowder, lacking words and touches. In such silence, love falls apart. Describing this silence in his poem, “ Ti sutra odlaziš” ( You Are Leaving Tomorrow ) Zrinko Tutić says:

 

 

"…one just needs to ride the emptiness

between me and you...

and everything would return..."

 

 

Even though he knows that a broken string, no matter how hard we try to mend it, will never produce the same tone, Zrinko tries to console himself with these verses because he believes that only words can break that oppressive silence. If nothing else, they can momentarily deceive his own pain. The same sense of alienation is encountered by the author in the poem "Ti gledaš televiziju"  ( You are watching TV). A girl dreams of her poet who sings to her from a magical box, while the living poet next to her longs for her conversation and touch. Everything Zrinko cannot find in life, he tries to touch in music. Yet even in music, the singer-songwriter only finds an echo of himself. Hence, his tones are filled with white darkness. More precisely, they are filled with light that he strives to illuminate the darkness, to illuminate his pain.

 

 

With no pretense, Zrinko speaks frankly to his love: "... I love you and I am not faithful to you..."

As painful as this truth may sound to his chosen one, those same words sound as if coming from a child to the reader. Under the spotlight, pain is beautiful, especially if it is not ours. I wonder, would a musician ever dare to direct the same verse to his music, to his art?

Considering that these are songs that have already been sung, readers should primarily read these verses as a musical score – to reach the notes through words. Here, words are actually just symbols that guide us to the melody. Often times, we remember the melody but forget the words.

 

 

And that's because there's more meaning in the tone of how words are sung or spoken than in the words themselves. Now, the question arises spontaneously: how did poetry come into existence at all? Perhaps from the great desire to translate silence or the song of a nightingale into words? All the world's poetry is judged by how good or bad these translations are. Yet the nightingale itself never thinks to explain its song with words. It simply sings, knowing it is at the source. However, as beautiful as a song may be, it also loves to hear that it is beautiful. Similarly, a word, no matter how grand, loves to hear words about itself. So, it's entirely natural for these sung songs to be printed. These verses should be seen as leaves that have freshly emerged on paper. Zrinko actually fears falling into routine. Unlike nature, which arrogantly renews itself, his nature strives for uniqueness. To always be new, a new melody without a chorus. Striving not only to create in that manner but also to live in that style.

 

 

Knowing himself quite well, and wanting to save his own love, Tutić exclaims:

"Run, run little girl

they are all towers of mud

run, run little girl

nooses around the neck..."

But the poet, all in laughter, quite sweetly, calms down and dreams within himself, saying:

"...it's not a big loss

when you kill a dreamer..."

In the poem "Stari vukovi," there is a verse that can encompass all of Zrinko's life and all of Zrinko's art. That verse reads:

"...on your heart a blue butterfly

lies dead..."

 

 

When Zrinko creates, that blue butterfly is alive. He plays with the wings to fly. As soon as Tutić falls into the routine, the blue butterfly is dead, regardless of Zrinko's heart keeping it warm.

Tutić should actually be left forever in a state of being in love, just for that blue butterfly. He should never transition from that weightless, Chagal-like state into the state of gravity.

Notes and verses may be written on paper, but music and spirit never fall so low.

 

 

Enes Kišević

In Zagreb, 01.01.2008.

 

 

P.S.

Remember him nicely.

Even nicer to see, to hear.

Resembles his music:

dreamy, TURQUOISEISH.