in white chalk upon the wall a boy scribbles no to war here against the spotless white a cop, in silence, came to life from that silence the cop swore lest there never be no war lest it never be my cup to the wall the cop steps up rain has washed the chalk today the sun goes down – boy’s locked away
underground
remember you’re always far from safety, expect whatever inevitability, believe what comes with ineluctability, make yourselves comfortable in the locality.
you hide in secrecy cut like a hide your heart then stitch inside the memory of privacy. tell your friends nothing
don't talk, give up intemperance. know two, know these and those on the wheel the devil knows but what one knows alone only God fathoms.
run full tilt leap and disappear with the scythe sweep the whole field clear deceive, outwit, outscoot don't shoot.
on the 9th of may
when the last veteran takes his final breath a month will pass before he will be found two schoolgirls with st. george’s ribbon bring a pack of buckwheat and a tin of stewed meat as ordered by the movement of the first he visited my school all those years ago vassily tyorkin he declaimed to us explained to us that when crossing the river we are the dirty ice beneath his feet beneath us that dark water only
congratulations: everyone made it into the future. the one with no eye, and the one with no legs I remember a beggar on a little wheeled board with a bayan in the moscow metro of my childhood I didn’t know where they came from it was just very, very scary
if one’s destined to be born in an empire, one can burn oneself or end up in a psych ward one can stare into the screen for many hours with bucha in one window and a dresser violet in the other, long desired
some turn away, others heed the fiend some go out the window, some go into green turn to ashes their great-grannies and grannies in armor inside bleak cemeteries their faces flattened onto rotted posters their garcías lorcas set on the bottles delete all message exchanges, don’t tell yourself any stories, save your strength, no point to struggle. grandma used to say: lest there be no special-operation she used to say grief is no despair as a kid i didn’t quite understand and then oh how did i mom dad i’m sorry and sad lest i should go all the way mad we open the gate we need that Vic- to- ry the cost of which we won’t spare at all but we stand on the shoulders of the undermourned dead we ride on boards of the lame and mauled and we lie down in frozen black snow and the sunset above us is as tight as a whip this land is not yours if it’s fatherland but shaman gabyshev will reach the point and not just anything but the dead will rise journalist irina slavina and defender of the udmurt language albert razin alexander okunev of the eternal flame of grannie and me no names remain
all the flags will come visit us into flags our flesh will be wrapped our flesh will be jerked on each flesh will put on its own flag lesbian lipstick will lie beside a trans mask each flag will go about its own case a case will be opened against every flesh of ours they will lay us face down, hands on our heads nonbinary people will inherit the earth but what earth will we leave them we went down into it loosened and lay there and ate all of it and spat it out under the boot of a cop on the raid of an ‘eshnik’ in the club, mama mother earth will put up with worse than this who will braid the nonbinary ones’ colored hair instead of holding them down with a gloved hand where are all the flowers where is that wonderful orchard where are the milk and honey where is your naked flesh it is only flesh only mine
2022-2026