By Frano Kulli
Dom Ndre Zadeja, the Anguish of Zija Vuka, and Father Anton Harapi without a Grave
Memorie.al / The invitation for the pilgrimage to the grave of Dom Ndre Zadeja, a few days ago, came to me somewhat twofold. The genuine invitation, like the others for the poets and writers persecuted and convicted by the regime, came from the organizers, the poets Rexhep Shahu and Izet Duraku. This beautiful act, a human feeling of respect, is something they undertake for the seventh time across Albania, with the support of the culture patron, Mr. Flamur Hoxha. A quite large group of poets, writers, and creators, mostly residing in Tirana, but also coming from Kukës or Tropojë, Berat or Pogradec, Mirdita and Tepelenë, Elbasan, Kavajë or Gjirokastër.
The second invitation, however, was a deeply felt one from Zija Vuka. Zija, the writer and Shkodran scholar who had taken on the leadership of the pilgrimage in Shkodër, transmitted his anguish in ethereal form to all his virtual friends. He had experienced this anguish at the Rr’maj Cemetery on the day he had gone for a preliminary visit, fulfilling his voluntary undertaking as a creator, but also a spiritual and respectful one, to Dom Ndre’s grave.
The grave, somewhat tucked away in a corner, leaning against the western wall of the cemetery, is a more than modest grave, rebuilt and blessed at the beginning of ’91, and now overgrown with grass and surrounded with a lack of care…! A sad lack of care for the poet, which had deeply affected Zija. For the poet, once well-regarded in the pantheon of contemporary poets in the first half of the twentieth century.
Simultaneously a playwright and polemicist, with many other talents. And called, as no one else, the “Poet of Sweetness”, a designation earned from his own literary work at the time of its writing…! The martyred poet, one of the 38 martyrs of the Albanian Catholic Church and of Albania.
The anguish that affects your own senses grows if you happen, for example, to have returned a few days ago from a visit to the famous catacombs of Rome. Because the history of their bloody origins has an affinity with our modest history. All that famous history of extreme martyrdom ignites the long-held idea that Christianity is a faith of martyrs.
Our own Dom Ndreu and our martyrs are, first and foremost, martyrs of their faith and conviction. But their distinct feature, perhaps specific to them, was the perpetual dedication: to “Faith and Fatherland”. And the ultimate message of all of them, right at the last moment before the firing squad: “Long Live Christ the King, Long Live Albania!”
Dom Ndre Zadeja is among the initiators of the calvary of suffering and martyrdom, following Dom Lazër Shantoja (1891 – March 5, 1945). Victims of the first ordeal of the post-war regime, which, in the foundations it was laying, sought the sublimation of every single one of those whose existence radiated love and faith. And the sanctity of freedom for them.
Bearers of profound knowledge, unconditional servants of faith and culture. Contrary in ideas to the communists, from the very beginning when those ideas were first imported into Albania. Similarly, they were subjected to the same ordeal as those who resisted those who expressed their irreconcilability with the platform of that bloody order and system that was being established…!
He was executed on March 25, 1945. A Sunday, Palm Sunday, one week before Easter. Placed “in the red circle” by the Reds, the pretext was the performance of the religious ceremony for a Catholic believer executed without trial, Tomë Marku, in the village of Sheldi, where Dom Ndreu was the parish priest.
Tomë, who had not disclosed the names of the villagers still keeping weapons at home to the Pursuit Forces. Ironically, it happened right here behind the wall of the Rr’maj Cemetery, where he has rested since that time. He was executed as the fourteenth person, along with Shkodrans and villagers from the surrounding villages.
With them was also Prek Cali, that tall mountaineer, over two meters and a true man, who had taken the lead in defending the borders of our land; against the Montenegrins with rifles, but also facing the Great Powers with wisdom and sagacity. And he had succeeded…! Because thanks to the resistance of the mountaineers led by him, Vermosh and the “Red Mountains” remained within Albania’s borders, where the calculations of the Great Powers, driven by the greed of Slavic chauvinists, had destined them not to be.
Regarding the “Poet of Sweetness,” I had the opportunity to hear about him early, during the era of rampant violence. Whispered, Prekë Ejlli, my family member who had him as a very dear friend, often conveyed Dom Ndre’s name among us. Especially when the conversation turned to wise matters, and he always spoke with a fervent reverence for him. Beyond the fear such mentions brought at that time…!
To mention the name of a priest was like mentioning Jews to the Nazis. Even though the Albanian priests were patriots through their works and the majority were highly educated. But he had him as his parish priest during his adolescence and was nurtured by the sweetness of his lyrics, of his musicalized prayers, or his catechism in verses.
Dom Ndreu was distinguished among priests and poets who used such a versification technique, where prayers written in verse by masters, yet simplified, were “musicalized” and thus conveyed among believers and the populace. Preka had known and enjoyed page by page his melodramas; he had even had the chance to see one of them on stage, such as “The Red Veil”, which was performed in Shkodër in 1937.
And so, the imaginary image of the poet and marked author of melodramas, a literary genre very much in vogue at the time, was also drawn for me as tenderness and wisdom, mixed with sweetness and humility. Later on, not infrequent meetings with Mr. Leci have been the charm of memories about Dom Ndreu-the-Poet. A supreme emotional experience was the one in 1994.
Mr. Leci was preparing his book about him for publication: “Dom Ndre Zadeja – The Works.” For him, this work would begin as a spiritual tribute to a man of his blood; Mr. Leci was his nephew. And so, along with the work, fragments of the martyr’s life would also crumble into the book…!
The murder of Dom Ndreu was conveyed with great civic pain in Shkodër. Amateur actors of the “Rozafat” society were continuing rehearsals for the performance of the melodrama “Rozafa,” by the author Zadeja. The news of the murder was… the gong marking the end of the show, even before it began. Work was halted. The seminarian Mark Çuni, in that spirit, composed the text of a song entitled “O mountains, why do you not roar?” which was set to music by another seminarian, Gjergj Lacaj…!
The author of the text would follow the poet’s fate two years later. Whereas the song’s composer lived long and also composed music. But he had never dared to cast the elegy for Dom Ndreu onto a staff. Fortunately, something of it was still in his memory. And that day, his memory was put to the test…!
Leci was convinced the song was still alive. With the author, where else…! I had the chance to experience their tearful and… Mournful reunion myself. I saw both of them, although old, shedding tears like children. Gjergji, “caught in the act,” with himself.
– “I never could write it down, Lec, even though I often sang it to myself. Silently, of course, more like a murmur… I haven’t forgotten the first stanza. Nor the chorus…” – and so the song was rewritten right there on the spot, text and music. Also, as a requiem for his soul…!
A poem for the executed poet had also been woven by the poet Xhevat Kallajxhiu. The poem was recited by him two weeks later, on April 10 of that year, during a spiritual ceremony at the Church of Leuca, in Messina in Southern Italy, in memory of the slain poet.
Meanwhile, the mourner Tina Marleci, the poet’s cousin, after her lament had moved all the hearts of those present with her chosen words, coming from genuine pain of the soul, tore the veil from the deceased’s throat. And all those present noticed that his shirt was patched. She then burst into tears again:
“Poor like Gurakuqi, Dom Ndre, brother, / The patched shirt with blood, Dom Ndre, brother!”
From Shkodër, to the Church of Saint Rrok in Shirokë. In memory of Father Anton Harapi, in his ancestors’ village. Jozef Shiroka, the actor, his great-nephew, was our guide and host there. Because it is still unknown where Father Anton Harapi’s remains rest. And there is no final resting place where one can pray for his soul and convey the deserved respect for him. / Memorie.al
