1. 

Soon or not too soon...
 I will go
  to Where 
people in white robes
  come from a great sorrow
   to serve God,
serve sincerely
  and with love...

There I will remember
   sitting by the river in the evening
when on the other bank
  lights lit up
and the gold of the paths,
  like a prayer,
    reached us
      across the water...

Where the little church shone 
  and there were
    many other good things...

Not only bad ones...

Whatever the time -
  the Middle Ages,
ours 
  or another...


2016 or 2017


                            ***

2. It's snowing again
  adding to the already high
   snowdrifts in the streets,

in the ce-
  me-
   te-
    ries
  where all the graves and paths
are covered by snow to the Skies...

How do they feel in there,
  our dear,
our dearest,
  the most loved ones...?

How is the soul connected with the body?

No one understood me in my family -
   some simply couldn't,
others didn't want to...

But they loved me,
  I hope...
And so
 did I...

Now they are gone...
   I'm left alone...

I turned to my cousins
  only to find new overtones of misunderstanding...

I'm trying to find support in the Past,
   but it seems to have become ephemeral...

And so are my images -
   of fleeting reflections,
of no less fleeting shadows...

I catch them
   by the eye of my camera
     making Time freeze...


My images can be forgotten,
   destroyed...
as all the material world...

And the Invisible One?

Will it welcome us in Eternity?
  Or deny?

Where shall we live?

They say,
   we shall live
     in the houses
       we can imagine...

So...
   I imagine the flats and the house of my childhood
with my parents,
 my grandparents...

When life was so full
   and reliable...



Feb. 11, 2026


                                        ***


3. On and on -
  always forward,
trying to achieve something,
   achieving nothing,
always hoping for the better,
   always aspiring...

Thus gradually,
  unconsciously
   and unnoticeably
    my life is flowing
     to the stage 
      of an old age...



Feb. 11, 2026


                                           ***


4. Fate 
   will not hesitate
     or think twice
to take a good dig in you,
  which is not very nice...


Feb. 10, 2026


                                         ***

5. I'm walking through the snow
   People are out with their dogs,
some have 2 or 3 on the leashes
  as if we lived in a tundra
and any minute rein deers can show up

I'd photograph
  this castle of a sky-scraper
   through the fir trees, but...

left my camera at home...

I have a camera in my old basic phone
   that I'm using now,
because my regular one is kaput

I'm trying to make a picture with it,
   but it says
"Insert the memory card"

Just what does it mean?
  There is one in

I remember my mother
   photographing in Sagrada Familia
(she called it Zagrada for some reason)
   with her basic phone

How could she do that at all!

We went to Barcelona
   for her World Congress on Mathematical Computation

I read out (in English) her great report

Almost 12 years have passed

  She has left this world

And I'm alone,
   in a broken health

If this weakness prolongs
  I may quite the scene 
    very soon -
for better? for worse?

Today I was suffocating in my masks
  on the tram,
in the Trade
   Center

I don't wanna to take them off
  If I get another virus or cold
it may be it

I could have never thought
   my life would come
to such a misery

I mustn't complain, though
 No...
   I'm not complaining at all

During the covid
  most of my things turned to rags -
because of the keeping conditions

And what have I turned into
  because of my living conditions...?

I cannot improve them
   Never could

My flat
   is stuffy and small -
not enough space for all
  my clothes and archives

The key word  -
   it's warm and mine

When I moved in
   it was cold and drafty,
so I had bigger radiators installed,
  had windows made fit for the frames,
so that there were no gaps or cracks

I'm not capable of such feats anymore

Also redecorated the old thing,
  but it never changed its ways -
falling apart before I could fix some part

When I moved in
  I lied on the sofa
   and looked up at the ceiling

I saw very clearly -
   it will be my grave,
my sepulcher

40 years have passed
  in a tough struggle

It was a difficult war...

Now I surrender at last
   raising and waving the White Flag

Yield...
  Defen-
ded...


It has won,
   my flat


Feb. 12, 2026



                                        ***

6. How to describe the stillness of these waters?
  Floating slowly,
    very slowly
     in the warm light of the early evening in May
       with an occasional splash of a fish
        sparkling its silver fins 
          above the greenish mirror surface,
            reflecting the trees images 
              growing thickly along the banks.


The first warm days of the new Spring, 
the first Spring in the 21st century,
  the first Spring in the new millenium,
    
which means
  that my whole life,
      all my experiences,
        feelings,
          emotions,
            recollections
have gone down 
  the 20th century - 
     for ever.

No, they have stayed 
  in me and with me - 
    for ever.

On a day like this
 you don't want to argue with anyone 
   in your mind,
  
you don't want to remember 
  anything nasty.

Thanks God, 
  there are no people around
    and very few in the whole park,
      so that I may forget
        about the angry movements of my mind
          for a while...


I'm thinking about my early teens
 and about England.

Will the love of my youth come back to me?
Will the delightful scent of England
  stay in my sensual memory?

The crows are croaking...

If everything should mean something
 this certainly means something.

In the meanwhile
  the river brings the adours of gardenia.

I'm writing this entirely for myself,
  without caring about the style,
   without a back thought
    of ever showing this to anyone.

I find it terrific not to have an imaginary reader
 always raising his/her ironical eyebrow
  or shrugging his/her I-don't-care-a-straw shoulder...

I find it amusing not to talk to anyone at all in my mind,
 not to share my thoughts -
  who would understand them anyway?

Maybe nobody,
 except my brother
  or my first love
   who will stay ideal
    for ever and ever,

because he has lived his life 
    with someone else...




May 1, 2001


                                     ***

7. NIGHT IN THE PARK

Another summer of my life...
  The old trees are going high,
    their trunks huge,
      the massive leaves
       are like thick dark-green whipped cream.


The lit lanterns are beautiful,
  especially their vibration
    in the water.
      They're scattered all around the park -
        lightning bugs.

Saying "When I was young"
  I'm mostly surprised.
Youth seems to be recent.
  And life passes by very quickly...
Although I'm not inclined 
  to say banalities right now.

Have I ever been?

The rhythm of this poem
  reminds me
of the one
  written 20 years ago... -

 (20 years ago? Really?)

where "the crows are croking"* -
  funnily I have to put myself in quotation marks -


  when I was fourty
and at the peak of my creativity.
    
    (Who was fourty?)


A lot of friends, my age,
    have passed away,
especially men,
  but women too. 
 

It's so strange.
  Whose turn is it now?
Mine? Or not yet?


The Evil Forces 
   have tested me up and down.
Now I can see their work.


However, they can't do anything
   if you don't accept their will.


It's good to be in control.
  It's also good
    not to be ravengeful in your mind
     forgetting bad things,
       forgiving the evil doers...


It's great
  to be used by the Upper Invisible Forces
   for arts and poetry...


People call it a talented person,
  but I don't do anything, really -
     ideas come by themselves...
God knows where from -
  I don't...


And yet I was chosen...


The Blissful Forces have been with me too!
  An unspeakable moment of life...

I don't want to be famous,
  I just want to feel this...


Life of the flesh has an end
  leading to Death.


Life of the Spirit is endless!
  The Prize is Eternal Life!


My pleasure lies in the Spirit...


Adherants of flesh can't understand it.
  Peace be with them...


And we, 
   trekkers of the Paths of the Gorgeous,
     seekers of the Invisible,
      we shall go our way...



Now most things are in the past,
  just in the mind...
What is left?


Whatever I've done
  does not seem to matter,
except my sins,
  my experience small.


I don't mean the sordid mundane experience, -
  I've never thought much of it -
   but the wanderings of the soul. 


Death is a great experience, 
  I believe.
    I'm really curious...


Life of the soul is much longer
  than this tiny stitch/strech on Earth.
Yet it has to be worthy.


Now that so little is left
  you have to be very careful
   about the slightest movement of your heart -
being aware of Who you're with.


Mosquitoes are biting
  the way they did
when I was a small girl.


  The trees haven't changed either.




Aug. 7, 2020

_______________________________________________________________

*"The crows are croking" - from my poem: http://lit.lib.ru/s/slobodkina_o/howtodescribedoc.shtml