no I wouldn’t care to discuss the message of war…
By Olga Bragina
Translated from the Ukrainian and Russian by Philip Nikolayev
***
no I wouldn’t care to discuss the message of war war doesn’t teach
anything or make anyone
better more efficient or more stress–resistant in a world of peace
you simply walk the streets of foreign cities
not understanding what you’re doing it’s truly wonderful here
so quiet and the pastries are incredibly tasty there are no
explosions except for
fireworks they welcome you warmly here and ask how you are and
no one here knows
what war is just as we didn’t before either
we saw war in movies but then we got fed up with the movies and
wanted to watch
something about the present
something about the world of real things not shadows in a cave
something about a world where missiles didn’t fall out of the blue
on people like in a bad
blockbuster thriller something about the actual world such that
we could recognize it and
could speak with it in its own language not in the language of war
* * *
It’s as if all this happened elsewhere in a parallel reality
as if pain had in fact spared the mapped location of our city
the words of an unknown language form wild asymmetries
may they not zero in on any subconscious conspiracies
it’s as if all of this did take place but the rest were futile
the body returning the soul gains the license to kill
here’s a glass tray for petals of bright transparent tongues
the city flowing with history’s blood is both hell and ground
of oblivion I remember you amid these paradigms
where it’s too dark for photos and too dark for paradise
the blatant death of carbuncles and the murder of Christmas
everything that we have must now be split in halves
between us as we are and us as we ought to be
you will have no more atonement for all eternity
the walls of the house collapse while I remain
who were we who didn’t even have a name
* * *
when they kill for the yellow–blue bracelet it seems that we are
out of words
one can extend the thesis adding that poetry is impossible after a
burnt hand with a little
yellow–blue bracelet I remember they used to sell them in subway
passages those
home–woven souvenirs
if there’s something to die for
what’s most impossible is that in Europe they tell me: “We’re
nomads we don’t know
what a homeland is and altogether what the word means”
if there’s something to die for what will remain of this little
plastic bracelet
everything will burn and fade everything that kills will burn
consume itself while life lives
on
what’s a piece of plastic in two colors
what is plastic what are ashes what is land land that’s yours and
land that isn’t yours
it’s the same land the differences are tiny no matter how far east
you go it proves to be
the same
the land is dark and the homeland salty
who can tell why plastic doesn’t catch fire doesn’t burn away why
a person dies or kills
each of these points may be answered but there are no answers
yellow–blue color
* * *
your message is forwarded to the answering machine
no don’t cry in vain no one dies under God
all those bodies killed in this war in this flood are filled with light
and stones
with sparks of electric current there should be no sorrow here
only lifeat half past three the machines grind removing each
other’s
garbage to not recognize
life and to die
a list of unknown persons here bread for the pigeons dries up on
the palm here only a
few days remain
to change the trajectory of where things are moving
write petitions with your left hand about what to preserve and
protect as if the world
were in the business of giving shelter
as if the heads of those who love you won’t grow gray as if we
were not abandoned like
infants in a winter field
to come out into the light following bird traces as children were
advised in books all this
is not in vain
believing what is advised in books that when fear or hope
envelops you the solution is
at hand
a shepherd leads the flock to the slaughter to a life–affirming tune
on the radio
bird tracks disappear under the crossfire downpour
blood floods the sky until you have stanched it
* * *
hey mother cuckoo the heart’s explosion a trap of words as they
imagined you blood the nightingale abyss will never leave you
as if there were nothing the sky is burning where once there were
underground shopping areas where we went daily for prayer
choosing from among what cannot be chosen like discord and
love we at first chose for ourselves what we didn’t need at all
then we screamed mentally under the open sky it’s just a need to
feel that someone needs you where the sky was crimson like blood
the country will arise again against the horror of life against the
arbitrariness of history the garbage that pollutes sadness burns
under the roof while we are poisoned by fear as in the folk song
the shoulder bag rolled off the big hump you cannot escape it will
stay with you forever this transparent earth incompatible with
hope in fact you’re simply not there it sings you lullabies so you
may fall asleep on the sand or draw or play it recruits soldiers any subjects of experiments it’s just that we are not used to losing but
that’s temporary
one day you’ll fail to guess a term like “pass the move” who wants
to give away freedom or to die for it like wicket gates of old terza
rima like a song pouring from the speakers about how life used to
be better before look back then the sky was truly blue and pure
and red blood of corals gathered into a necklace it’s just that back
then life was such that we were a mere background to it painted
silhouettes fictions of the imagination disbelieved omens don’t
hold on to what isn’t yours whether to live on your knees or
perish in a struggle is not a matter of choice like a dawn outside
the window that slices off the top of the sky no one ever knows
what’s really behind it the glass dome breaks like beloved
porcelain no I’ll never become an astronaut where can you flee
from here and you know what it’s not like you are some kind of
ideal yourself and every person will receive a reward if not
freedom then a trap in which you feel its words are only for you
only yours so cherish them