In her metaphysical poetry collection, Black Holes Within Us, Marta Markoska calls the universe into play, as both the context for her love and as providing a means for its expression. Her poems are full of ordinary details from everyday modern living, but are paradoxically pervaded with classical, philosophical and scientific allusions. They contain interesting and perceptive ideas – for example, about the self, the continuous skirmishes between the sexes on topics as various as the day’s meals and sexual fulfilment – expressed in simple words and images, and are, at different levels, accessible to all. *** “The poetry of Marta Markoska is bleak but enlightening. Each poem forces us to think about matters that are unthinkable – aiming to destroy our favourite beliefs and wishes. What is true, what is good, and what is beautiful to us are, in her poems, almost always certainly not what they seem. Yet, in a strange sort of way, the poet concludes her vision in her opening quotation, ‘We should leave truth to the Gods.’ ... the urban rebel stands side by side with an unarticulated form of mysticism – we are all just playing here.” ―Elbert Siu Ping Lee, author of Rain on the Pacific Coast (Proverse Hong Kong, 2013)