Poetry

Questions for Vera

What do you keep in that smallest box?   It’s where I’ve locked away my land, black bread, cabbages and hens, dots of dandelions in swathes of grass around our dacha, my medals, the Soviet flag, a samovar and glasses, summer, plunging in cold rivers, my mother.   And in the next?   Here, I’ve wrapped my losses, the siege of Stalingrad, the hush of black marias, like ravens in the snow, hungry cries of children, empty shelves and secrets, the camp that took away my lover, all the disappeared, the ice and lies and blood.   This is the…

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