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This piece is about 7 printed pages long. It is copyright © Polina Andrukovich and Christine A. Dunbar and Jacket magazine 2008. See our [»»] Copyright notice. The Internet address of this page is http://jacketmagazine.com/36/rus-andrukovich-trb-dunbar.shtml

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Polina Andrukovich

Tr. Christine A. Dunbar




***

the salted knowledge
of the meanings of meanings
there, in hades, space sees
here space is deaf and blind
no ninths    it aches no hos    i want to go to hades to wo
rk and drink some water, which hears
here’s draft of space into itself
the water here
has begun to smell          like fried meat

* * *
analyzed by the sun through you elect
ricity in late autumn from the harbor, not
to save later, it seems, debris and
from the brought from snow earth

the analyzed concentrates itself in you
concentrated autumn a knife for cans
snow rain knife of time of gaze

* * *

but the wind really just wanted to be
        and I glanced around in fear
                 at this movement
            of smoke left over from breathing
            and the rhythm of breathing broke
                       on “here” and “there”
            but the wind just wanted to be

and the wind was gentle to the smoke and the movement
of smoke, at which I glanced, was gentle

* * *
             
                   o the noise of your eyes?
when the noise of your eyes lies on me
                          in my hands i knead air
                          belonging to coitus
                 thank god there is no photograph
                 in which I am holding a bouquet
           don’t you see, no wait, don’t you see, it’s
almost a haiku:
                                                                         5—7-5:
                       thank-god-there-is-no
                       pho-to-graph-in-which-I-am
                       hold-ing-a-bou-quet

* * *

the structures of envy are cruel and rough
                           and insufficiently sharp
the structures of desire are sharp and fat
                                 and this cries:
         the slow countenance of materials decays and ti
                                   me moves away from structures:

                                                their contact with
time
                                                        q no wait would be a s
hort circuit

* * *

and i spread over the day’s air
                   and cover the stale answer with my hands:
                              carelessly repenting
                              careless repentance, the butterfly of someone’s soul
your soul’s
                              eavesdropping spirit
for me
                   you were my view from the window to
                                                            this fable
                             but the appearance of movements changed
                                         in that i         know
                                                              what i’ll put on then

and the day which does not have me
and the plastic of non-existence-here             sharp
                                                                               sufficiently

and i spread with a glance
                            and the butterfly through the glass
                            looks attentively

***

i awaited her phrase from the park
but did not cross the road
because there was no crosswalk
walks that didn’t have an end but
you could hear there couldn’t you   too warm and
a drop of the second snow on the glasses
in that spot, where there’s usually a green
stat no wait   star and apologies from god, who
‘ll pass on the phrase a little later
when a drop slowly vaporizes
on the glass, but what if by
some chance I reflexively forget and
rub it off

* * *

he broke the glass in the house with a view
                             of the sea
and on the next day he died here
a cigarette fell out of the pack
when darkness began
then the cassette ended

i didn’t go for medicine
don’t worry about it, i’ll go wednesday

i turned the tape over afteryourcall

Albinoni told the story of how once
when Paco de Lucia left

and in my hands remained
only the smell of smoke

* * *

copper flowed through glass at night
he’s           sick          with            strings

i rock on the chair: the modem is being put in
the cat is asleep; what’s going on with her?
you could understand, but there is no
structure now
more and more often there is no structure, more and more often
you cannot remember I noticed more and more
there is no structure but about me falls
a word or snow?

yellow-orange nights
to drag your well-groomed face
to the clouds
at night
right by
the sun

***

not-god in flowers dries          not-god
appear silhouettes of cancer; having dried out
of after-birth, not-god dressed as a falcon
         swallows the dust of flowers; in him grow
hot prickly oranges and influ
ences with the anticipated taste the sup
ple taste of nothing,... required to cover
every square, prolonging the pleasure . . .

***

unknown sodium
forgotten           cadmium
naïve, fluid             empty
they pay me with dreams
             to live with this cough
                    today
better to die from you,
    than from something of yours
           forgotten name of cadmium

to find your forgotten
            in the scenario of black
                            nerves is simple
and now
                the filled name of stone

add a lemon        cynic
                    price list for tomorrow

a fuss in the backsight no wait
                a fuss in the cross hairs
         or tie a bow with thread
onto the window and
                             leave,
                    like yesterday, so as to know
            what the next. song will be (. . .)

* * *

we walk in shadows         concea
      ling        everything last
   the last hands the last body

the last unkm no wait
the last unknown word
the last mistake in the last
                                   unknown
anesthesia
                         co
nceals itself glance
the last
                         co
ceals itself
by substance of smoke
                                                 in a shadow and
        you walk, imagining to yourself
imagining to yourself flowers           that you’ve seen, and be
        having to the forgotten
flowers like you behave to yourself                      be
                  ginning a conversation
from that
shadow of yours . . .

* * *

an exlcusive hell and           what a pity
is this better or a bit annoying
or simply unpleasant
      unpleasant is more logical
and illogical pity “is better”
      fuss and voids
      in an exclusive hell but
what about
those characteristic traits           of yesterday?

* * *

the point of god is everywhere
god is there         where there is the border
of god in a point
which is everywhere
and the lines between
gods
do not form the borders of the figure
which depends
on the light near
that cypress which didn’t exist

 
Polina Andrukovich

Polina Andrukovich




Polina Andrukovich (b. 1969) has a degree in animation from the Russia State Cinematography Institute. She has published poetry in Vozdukh, Novy Bereg, and Vavilon. Her book of poems One Voice Smaller was published in 2004.

 
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