Classic and Contemporary Poetry
LETTERS TO YESENIN: 5, by JAMES HARRISON Poet Analysis Poet's Biography First Line: Lustra. Officially the cold comes from manitoba Last Line: With endless thirst. Alternate Author Name(s): Harrison, Jim Subject(s): Cold; Drinks & Drinking; Russia; Yesenin, Sergei (1895-1925); Wine; Soviet Union; Russians | ||||||||
Lustra. Officially the cold comes from Manitoba; yesterday at sixty knots. So that the waves mounted the breakwater. The first snow. The farmers and carpenters in the tavern with red, windburned faces. I am in there playing the pinball machine watching all those delicious lights flutter, the bells ring. I am halfway through a bottle of vodka and am happy to hear Manitoba howling outside. Home for dinner I ask my baby daughter if she loves me but she is too young to talk. She cares most about eating as I care most about drinking. Our wants are simple as they say. Still when I wake from my nap the universe is dissolved in grief again. The baby is sleeping and I have no one to talk my language. My breath is shallow and my temples pound. Vodka. Last October in Moscow I taught a group of East Germans to sing "Fuck Nixon," and we were quite happy until the bar closed. At the newsstand I saw a picture of Bella Akhmadulina and wept. Vodka. You would have liked her verses. The doorman drew near, alarmed. Outside the KGB floated through the snow like arctic bats. Maybe I belong there. They won't let me print my verses. On the night train to Leningrad I will confess everything to someone. All my books are remaindered and out of print. My face in the mirror asks me who I am and says I don't know. But stop this whining. I am alive and a hundred thousand acres of birches around my house wave in the wind. They are women standing on their heads. Their leaves on the ground today are small saucers of snow from which I drink with endless thirst. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...OXOTA: A SHORT RUSSIAN NOVEL: CHAPTER 259 by LYN HEJINIAN A FOREIGN COUNTRY by JOSEPHINE MILES THE DIAMOND PERSONA by NORMAN DUBIE IN MEMORIAM: 1933 (7. RUSSIA: ANNO 1905) by CHARLES REZNIKOFF TAKE A LETTER TO DMITRI SHOSTAKOVITCH by CARL SANDBURG READING THE RUSSIANS by RUTH STONE THE SOVIET CIRCUS VISITS HAVANA, 1969 by VIRGIL SUAREZ A PROBLEM IN AESTHETICS by KAREN SWENSON THE IDEA OF BALANCE IS TO BE FOUND IN HERONS AND LOONS by JAMES HARRISON |
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