Култура

His name stands in our hearts under the sign of immortality, wrapped in the halo of a saint, and he himself shines like an under-burning candle in the temple of revolution.
From the depths of time, from the darkness of slavery, we behold the radiance of the dagger, the revolver, and the Gospel, before which he joins together in a bloody rebellious union the revolutionaries, and we hear his incantations: "Time, too, does not want easy talk from us, but personal deeds, many deeds, pure deeds.... History will not attach the merits of others and people state our livelihood as long as the name Bulgarian lasts."
In our historical memory, we rely on what he wrote, that everything should be short and clear, honest and pure, and something more - true and holy. For him these are not words and wishes, but the essence of all his thoughts and actions, a complete fusion of thought, word and deed. Having renounced ranks and posts, like lightning, a troubled glows in the night and searches for the steepest spiral in the orbit of honor, and however long it may divide us, it remains unique to us and devoted like no other. In it we find the most revered features of the Bulgarian, which are ancestral and which come from afar and go far.
At the altar of revolution and freedom, in front of the cherished dream of a clean and holy republic, stands a document that replaced the halo - Levski's notebook. In it he kept a strict account of the people's money spent. And he spent - on candles, opines... And no matter that for three days he had nothing to eat - for the olives he returned the money back and reported that it cost 1 grosche and 10 money... In front of this report we stand mute today. He who gives his life, but accounts for ten dollars, has no reason to explain that he should be trusted. This account is a whole moral code, a catechism of morals and human virtues, a call not to be startled by its purity and to check our conscience with its orbit of honor...
What is your orbit, Apostle? - All the settlements in Bulgarian, all the plains and fields and mountain paths in which your steps sink and from them meek deer drink water. Where is your place? - In the classrooms of the Bulgarian school, where from the portrait you watch how time passes through us and how it dwells more permanently in us. There is no sunset for you, for you must cover with radiance your land, which is also ours. We need you today too, Apostle, so that when you tell us how to love a people, how to pity a kindred, how to give life for life, in a moment of reckoning to atone for all our darknesses, mistakes and sins and to try to approach your stature as measured by an arch of time called eternity. And I ask myself today, staring at the blue lakes of your questioning gaze: Are we the people to whom a sacrifice has been promised for its liberation? Is this the pure and holy republic of your dreams?
Are we turning time or is it turning us - against ourselves?
Where, when and how we broke that umbilical cord that had firmly tied the Bulgarian to the Haidushki Balkan and became lost in the world... And there? There are no Haidushki fires and cool taverns, wafers of sedenki and copper kavals, rhodopian halibut and patterned guberi, boxed gates and quiet courtyards, old verandas of father's houses, maiden yards with small gardens, smell of roses and geraniums, of early bosilek. Others are there dimensions! Others are people, manners, ideals... There something is plucked from people's souls along with the root. There we are... tree - no root, song - no voice, stone - no place. And people say, "Every stone weighs in its place." So our place is here... at our roots of life. If we baptize all our love and joy, all our pain and tears with your faith, we will be a tree - with roots, a song - with a clear voice, a deceiving horizon and bright hope.
And I stand silently beside you... Next to you! Because I know: before us is your and my Bulgaria. And my Bulgaria travels... along with you, along with me, along with us - we take the longest journey - in infinity and... to eternity.
Ekaterina Mihailova