the lilies of the valley
smell the same as when we picked them in the woods
with Aunt Lusya, and got yelled at
because they’re endangered and here we are pulling them up
at night mosquitoes in the village outhouse
fly at the dim bulb, smoke from the neighboring yards,
motorcycle roar in the road and promise of a storm tonight
the old showerstall is long locked where my mother and I washed in the downpour
when I was a child I loved looking at her breasts:
they seemed so good to me, I was happy
just to see them in passing somewhere in the bathroom
yesterday I saw a duck with ducklings, swimming after them
a little ferocious dog, beloved by his buzz-cut owner
like an only, natural son.
we washed my son today in the tub, I remember: they washed me
put the tub on a stool, another one underneath
I bent my head and they poured water down from a pan
then tied my wet hair up in a scarf
and wearing that scarf I once saw my reflection in some glass
and like Narcissus I was shaken and thought I was so beautiful
that I couldn’t look away, and I never looked like that again
also I remember: in the storm the guys drove me around on their motorcycles
and Yura once let me drive while he sat behind crossing himself
as I tore down the highway at maximum speed
later Yura crashed, and I saw his twisted motorcycle in the road
so I understood: a man might crash on his motorcycle
or die in a fight, while what often awaits women is to be raped
“let me have you, before somebody rapes you,”
the first man I loved would say to me, when I was thirteen
and when I was fourteen, five gangster bros did
try to rape me; we grew up that way—like thistles
from the clotheslines with their pins wind tore the laundry
that had not been taken down in the storm, rainwater overflowed gutters poured from barrels
barrels blooming with sweet yellow pollen, we tore the heads off snout beetles
and from their bodies leaked a white liquid, like pus,
and they were saying something on the Mayak station on an old receiver
while the sky seethed—as though you’re boiling an egg, it cracks and some of the white leaks through
everywhere I saw this heavenly tide
seems God’s grandmother
washed the clothes with detergent powder, then
poured everything oh into the bushes
right onto the earth

Translated from the Russian

poetry-magazine“the lilies of the valley”

“the lilies of the valley”