A bird flies home

By Victor Solodchuk

Translated from the Ukrainian and Russian by Anna Halberstadt

***

A bird flies home,
because it feels like a need
without feeling tired,
across the open sky.
And on earth hopes
get mixed with curses.
The bird flies over Kyiv,
it flies over Kherson.
A lark, a stork,
an oriole, a linnet.
A bird flying from afar
does not expect treachery.
And on the earth down there —
reactive volleys and threads of tracers.
The bird flies over Rivno,
flies over Cherkasy.
Where it is going to land
in that vortex — God knows.
Souls circulate in a vortex,
birds fly home.

March 1, 2022