rabbit/light

There are cracks down the length of it.

There is ache when it rains.

There are poets with history and poets without history, Tsvetsaeva

     claimed living through the ruin of Russia.

Karina says disavow every time I see her. We, the daughters between

     countries, wear our mean mothers like scarves around our necks.

Every visit, mine recounts all the wrongs done against her

ring sent for polishing returned with a lesser diamond, Years of never

     rest and, she looks at me, of nothing to be proud of.

I am covered in welts and empty pockets so large sobs escape me in the

     backroom

of my Landlord’s fabric shop. He moves to wipe my tears

as if I’m his daughter or

I’m no one’s daughter.

It’s true, I let him take my hand, I am a girl who needs something.

     I slow cook bone

grief, use a weak voice.

My mother calls me the girl with holes in her hands, every time I lose

     something.

All Russian daughters were snowflakes once, and in their hair a ribbon

     long as their body knotted and knotted and knotted into a large translucent

     bow.

It happens, teachers said, that a child between countries will refuse to

     speak. A girl with a hole in her throat, every day I opened the translation

     book.

Silent, I took my shoes off when I came home, I put my house clothes on.

We had no songs, few rituals. On Yom Kippur, we lit a candle for the

     dead and no one knew a prayer.

We kept the candle lit, that’s all.

The wave always returns, and always returns a different wave. I was small. I built a self outside my self because a child needs shelter.

Not even you knew I was strange, I ate the food my family ate, I answered to my name.

https://theredlist.com/wiki-2-20-881-1399-1161-235972-236038-view-1910-1920-1-profile-1914-ble-coq-d-or-the-golden-cockerel-b.html

Il y a des poètes de l’Histoire et des poètes sans l’Histoire, Tscetsaeava

    revendiquait survivre à la ruine de la Russie.

Karina dit désavoue chaque fois que je la vois. Nous, les filles entre

      les pays, portons nos mères malveillantes comme des écharpes autour de nos cous.

A chaque visite, la mienne recompte tout les torts faits à son encontre

une bague envoyée pour être polie est retournée avec un diamant en moins, Années sans jamais

   de repos et, elle me regarde, de rien n’est fière.

Je suis couverte de papules et de poches vides si larges que des sanglots m’échappent dans la

   pièce arrière    

du magasin de tissu de mon propriétaire. Il vient pour essuyer mes larmes

comme si j’étais sa fille ou

je ne suis la fille de personne.

C’est vrai, je le laisse prendre ma main, je suis une fille qui a besoin de quelque chose.

   Je cuis lentement l’os

du chagrin, utilise une voix faible.

Ma mère m’appelle la fille avec des trous dans les mains, chaque fois que je perds

   quelque chose.

Toutes les filles russes ont été des flocons de neige, et dans leurs cheveux un ruban

   long comme leur corps noué et noué et noué en une large et translucide

    révérence.

Ca arrive, disent les professeurs, qu’un enfant entre des pays refuse de

      parler. Une fille avec un trou dans sa poitrine, chaque jour j’ai ouvert le livre

    de traduction.

Silencieuse, j’ai enlevé mes chaussures quand je suis arrivée à la maison, j’ai ôté mes vêtements.

Nous n’avions pas de chansons, quelques rituels. A Yom Kippour, nous allumions une bougie pour les

  morts et personne ne connaissait de prière.

Nous gardions la bougie allumée, c’est tout.

La vague revient toujours, et toujours revient une vague différente. J’étais petite. J’ai construit un moi en dehors de moi-même parce qu’un enfant a besoin d’un refuge.

Pas même toi savais que j’étais étrange, je mangeais la nourriture que ma famille mangeait, je répondais à mon nom.  

“This poem is about the way immigrant children rewire themselves, how we overwrite our own language coding and in doing so betray our first love, which is sound and meaning. In this way we also betray our families and our child-selves (who need us desperately to return).” —Gala Mukomolova

Gala Mukomolova earned a BA from Hobart and William Smith Colleges and an MFA from the University of Michigan.

Her work has appeared in the Indiana Review, Drunken Boat, PANK, and elsewhere. In 2016 Mukomolova won the 2016 Discovery/Boston Review Poetry Prize. She writes horoscopes on her website, The Galactic Rabbit.

Everytime we let straights make out in our bars while we couldn’t touch because of laws – It was an act of perversion. 

Everytime we put on the proper clothes to go to a family wedding and left our lovers at home – It was an act of perversion. 

Eastern European lesbian poets, writers.

Irena Klepfisz (1941-) is a Jewish-Polish lesbian activist, author, academic. Currently lives in America. 

Marina Chen (1970-), is a Koryo-saram lesbian poet from Russia.

Olga Krause (1953-) is a Jewish lesbian from Russia, a poet, author, and musician.

Erzsébet Galgóczi (1930-1989), was a Hungarian writer, playwright, and screenwriter. Started living openly as a lesbian from the 1970s.

Sophia Parnok (1885-1933), often dubbed as “the Russian Sappho”, was a Jewish-Russian lesbian poet, and the first openly-lesbian poet of Russia.

Anna Barkova (1901-1976), was a Soviet poet, who survived three periods of inprisonment, the first arrest was for writing an ironic poem about Stalin. Wrote about her sexuality in her diary.

Nataša Velikonja (1967-) is a sociologist, poet, essayist, translator, lesbian activist from Slovenia.

Masha Gessen (1967-) is a Jewish-Russian and American journalist, author, activist. Described as “Russia’s leading LGBT rights activist”.