tykha nich, sviata nich...

[kutia]

she left us forty days ago,
she went to the pleiades.
a bird overhead scattering feathers,
snow amongst the lilies of the river still flowing –

(pid kryhoju spyt’ skryplyva pisnia...)*

& now long winter shadows fall
across the light that peals like bells, aching
like teeth rattling softly in a blue urn.

(na dykykh travakh spochyvajut’ zerny...)

these nights fold us in sudden,
the settling of a smoke-blue sky
as light turns over, a quilt flipped
& fluffed, colour of a swallow’s back.

(v synomu nebi ptashka litaje, vona nas okhoronjaje...)

i need to stop crying on photographs,
crying before the ikons, halos beaten gold
like flecks in her egg-blue eyes, but
she isn’t coming back to us with wooden dolls
& photographs of her country, far away...

(divchyno, pam’iatai tse!)

& i miss her. miss her like her wedding ring
misses its strong papery finger, polished
by sweat & flour & wool running across
her palms. & i know she’s here now

but why does she feels so far off,
dispersed like dust in the last of the sun, floating
like seeds & songs & kernels & birds
into the omniscience of wind?

(ale divchyno, pam’iatai!
v synomu nebi ptashka litaje, vona nas okhoronjaje
pid tykhamy krylamy...)

* * *
the italicized lines translate roughly t0:

= under the ice a creaking song is sleeping
= in the wild grasses the seeds are resting
= in the dark blue sky a bird is flying, she watches over us
= my dear, remember this!
= my dear remember, in the dark blue sky a bird is flying,
is protecting us beneath her quiet wings


~j.