Rifet Bahtijaragic, a Canadian and Bosnian writer, has for some time been broadening the cultural activities of Bosnians far away from Europe, in Canada. After the publication of his two novels, Blood in the Eyes and Bosnian Boomerang, came a collection of poetry, Eyes in the Cold Sky. Now he has given us Footprints: Poetry and threads of a poetical impression. In form and content it is a unique, innovative book. It comprises poetry and poetic/philosophical prose, interweaving the personal and the regional, the general and the global, the national and the supra-national, the emotional and the philosophical, the earthly and the cosmic into a gripping portrayal of the human need to understand the essential questions of endurance and the survival of civilization Rifet Bahtijaragic's Footprints leaves a deep impression on the human heart and mind. There is prose in the form of fictive interviews with a broad spectrum of leaders in our turbulent times Marshal Tito, Michael Moore, the Dalai Lama, and Stephen Hawking. There is poetry born out of the recent Bosnian War lyrical, bitter, impassioned, searching, and ultimately hopeful. This book makes explicit ideas and opinions we should all heed. Rifet creates simple, graspable explanations for the secrets of the universe as well as for those of the human heart. His cosmic poetry and prose offer the hope that somewhere, beyond the world we have created, there are worlds we can communicate with and thus, maybe, be saved from ourselves.
