Two birds on the grey, ashy sand.
The sleeping bird is on the right; her feathers are dull
and forgetting has prepared a place for her in the fallen leaves.
The wind tears a feather from her wing, to write
in the rain’s invisible ink the word umbra
on one side and lumen on the other, over where
the second bird cries over the dead one, opening its yellow beak.
Sending you this picture, I only want to say
that I can be both birds at once.
Anzhelina Polonskaya (born 1969) Russia
Translated from Russian by Andrew Wachtel
Source: Pen International, Vol 60 No 1, 2010
thank you for the find
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