If There is Something to Desire Read Free Page A

have time to turn
    into flowers, clay, white-eyed memory …
    But while we are mortal, my love, to you
    nothing will be denied.

90
    Eternalize me just a bit:
    take some snow and sculpt me in it,
    with your warm and bare palm
    polish me until I shine …

91
    dropped
    and falling
    from such
    heights
    for so
    long
    that
    maybe
    I will have
    enough time
    to learn
    flying

92
    He marked the page with a match
    and fell asleep in mid-kiss,
    while I, a queen bee
    in a disturbed hive, stay up and buzz:
    half a kingdom for a honey drop,
    half a lifetime for a tender word!
    His face, half-turned.
    Half past midnight. Half past one.

93
    Spinner, do not hesitate:
    while the kiss is fresh,
    snip the two threads
    with one swift cut.

94
    On the chin, on its edge,
    under the chin many a kiss …
    The golden boat trembles
    on the surface of closed eyes.
    Hair, rowlocks, clavicles,
    fuzzy skin, lilies, reeds …
    Every particle of me knows
    what has happened, what is bound to be.
    And I proffer my face, my shoulders
    to the miracle as to the wind.
    Come and row. A child again,
    I will sleep curled up on the stern.

95
    If only I could elope
    to share with you the roof and the road!
    But it is easier to bend the Milky Way,
    to straighten out the rainbow,
    to put an end to the Chechen war,
    to feed starving kids on songs.
    Should I stop loving you? Wish I could!
    Easier to build a house on the waves.

96
    I spin my destiny myself,
    in this I need no help.
    They confiscated at the airport
    the scissors from the Parca.
    A ripe tear rolled off,
    the frail shoulders shook.
    But the customs fellow did not speak
    a word of ancient Greek.

97
    We would hide behind the house
    to play the maternity ward:
    would walk around with bellies stuck out,
    with a shard of glass would scratch
    the bellies that were feeling a chill
    to make a white and pink line;
    would say: it is up to you,
    if the mother lives,
    the baby will die,
    or the other way around,
    in short, it’s either-or,
    and no other way out.
    But there is. I should have slapped
    the silly midwife for her lies,
    should have proudly stormed out
    of that stupid maternity ward.
    I would do so now. But at the time
    I bathed in the bliss of shame,
    shielded the belly with my hand:
    let the baby live.

98
    A poem is a voice-mail:
    the poet has stepped out, most likely
    will not be back. Please leave a message
    after you hear a gunshot.

99
    The voice. The handwriting. The gait.
    Maybe the smell of my hair.
    That’s all. Go ahead,
    resurrect me.

100
    Only she who has breast-fed
    knows how beautiful the ear is.
    Only they who have been breast-fed
    know the beauty of the clavicle.
    Only to humans the Creator
    has given the earlobe.
    The humans, through clavicles
    slightly resembling birds,
    entwined in caresses fly
    at night to the place where,
    rocking the cradle of cradles,
    the babe is wailing,
    where on a pillow of air
    the stars nestle like toys.
    And some of them speak.

Acknowledgments
    The author and the translator are thankful to Deborah Garrison, Derek Walcott, Valentina Polukhina and Daniel Weissbort, Alice Quinn, Yelena Demikovsky and Brian Singh, Cecile Roulet and Michael Wyler, and Svetlana Buyanina for their assistance and support in preparing this book for publication.
    “One Touch in Seven Octaves” was first published in
Tin House.
“We are rich, we have nothing to lose,” “If there is something to desire,” “I think it will be winter when he comes,” and “Let us touch each other” first appeared in
The New Yorker.
“Am I lovely? Of Course!” “Those who are asleep in the earth,” “To converse with the greats,” “I am in love, hence free to live,” “Multiplying in a column M by F,” “When the very last grief,” “He marked the page with a match,” and “Only she who has breast-fed” first appeared in
Poetry
. “Armpits smell of linden blossom” first appeared in
Modern Poetry in Translation 20: Contemporary Russian Women Poets,
edited by Daniel