from the indifferent dark
as from a rock
oozed the breasts
of the fruit of knowledge
lips wove
a cry
arms uttered
a painful word
chastity fell
to its knees
from that moment was
chaos
and my not distant eyes
that became blades
perceived
in that sweet darkness
a swarming of presence
in the ravine between the breasts
the solitary flower of the lips
breaks through
and on a thin stalk
carries out the red form
of the heart
across long fallen leaves
dead stalks
of half-forgotten favors
only now
in this ravine on the narrow
ascent out of the abyss
into which could squeeze
only my fingers
you crumpled into a clump
of fertile soil the substance
at the root of resurrection
from this place
we shall grow into a slender tree
and some day
no one shall be able to divide
autumn mourning
into yours and mine
the one thing of value
that cannot be marketed
two streams
that cannot be stepped over
that dams cannot dam
would that I were
that earth
that I might absorb them
would that I were
that cloud
that I might drink them
but no earth
no single spirit
holds sway over them
for they flow
from those secret springs
the same beginnings
as tears
thus we know one another
in a dream
we dreamed
millions of years ago
with a stone axe
I hunted down fire
it trembled like a deer
like hair it overflowed
it escaped across the threshold
of our locked lips
it splashed into our pupils
symbols of the subconscious
it screamed dark words
which even now are beyond understanding
listen
such dreams
are forgotten immediately
on awakening
the slanting rays of the evening
if only to extend the road
into despair
if only to stretch hands out
to the inaccessible
if only to widen eyes
to take in the infinite
if only to fit into the word
the kernel of the word
those slanting rays
trail after me
in ribbons of blood
and when wide eyes
of wakefulness
probe the deaf wall
of darkness
there shall be in the slough
buried alive
silver slivers
from the mirror of eternity
fragments of memories
of a brief love
and so it happened
on the black slate
beside the tracks of the fern
your palm
was fossilized
with the line of destiny
clearly broken
Ihor Kalynets (born 1939) Ukraine
Translated by Volodymyr Hruszkewycz
Source: Four Cycles of Poems, Ihor Kalynets, Ukrainian Literature. Volume 4, 2014
Original publication: Ihor Kalynets', “Dosvid virsha,” Zibrannia tvoriv u dvokh tomakh, Volume 1, Kyiv: Fakt, 2004, pp. 204–8.
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