Sasha Dagdal. Forever

Poem from the collection Catechism. Poems for Pussy Riot , prepared by an English pen club

Sasha Dagdal

Forever

Among the Christian martyrs

Young mothers met,

They were the worst of all.

Growing out the soul and heart, plunging out of the body

Yellow, with a bird breast, a living lump,

Giving him to plop down to the prison slope,

You understand that you are from the water

And you can cry from the smell of rosemary,

Milk and bread. Every night

Doubt creeps to them, hisses and shy,

Express arteries, strings of nerve fibers:

With every night in a dream, they are closer to death,

Because they have already bifurcated once,

Because they know: the warrior of the blade sharpens,

To cut them in two. In half.

Translation by Marina Boroditskaya