QUESTIONS FOR LYUDMILA
In winter, we have hours of trembling light
to be together. The evening is spent
just you and I,
and all the questions about your country.
Masha, Masha, you say. That was my name
you gave me here, always a name
that rolled from the tongue to the heart of the heart.
We order blini and wine,
and you explain.
Your grandmother’s name was Lyudmila. In her kitchen,
you ate with the dead. The walls were grey with their faces,
wondering down at your new childhood
of pink roller skates and bubblegum jeans. She
clicked her tongue because you
no longer dreamt of being a cosmonaut. You
were a princess with beach-braids
and eight TV channels. They taught you to say your name in English,
and there was a power in that.
You show me how to fold a blini, and describe your grandma’s hair.
It was wavy beneath a tight scarf. At night,
she brushed it in the darkness, like writing a poem to a lover.
That is how you said it, like writing a poem to a lover,
as you wrap white cream into a roll. The times
were the times. There were many who loved her.
In her kitchen, jars sat on the shelf like poltergeists.
They dropped themselves,
and she would beat you out back,
then taught you about cherries in winter
gherkins in spring. She was happy,
growing children like sleepy cabbages,
plucking yarn from her good dress. She was happy, and do I
understand that? I say yes.
There is no other way to describe it. And you,
you prepare me that blini, and it isn’t a blini,
it is your grandmother’s ghost,