by Irina Mashinski
     translated by B.Dralyuk and the author

At dawn someone sober hangs a sky
like a worn-out
wrinkled screen on the village’s far end,
the old projector rolls in from the East
on its heavy cart,

and I walk through the tall grass of Russian syllables,
where colons and commas are abundant
in June,

                                     and syntax is vague on ladybugs’ wings.

I would settle nowhere else,
wouldn’t settle for less,
trust me,
nothing would ever suffice, but

how do I explain
how I dread
the expression
on my motherland’s face?

by Vladimir Druk
translated by Lev Fridman

     from the book “Alef–Bet. Forms, Numbers and Nominations”

bow your head
and speak
with your head bowed

as if you are no longer here
as if you aren’t here yet
as if there is nothing there yet

as if everything is just about to appear
speak
as if you’re at the very start or near the end

speak up when everyone is silent or screaming in pain
cry out as if you are alone
in the middle
of nothing

speak
as if He is speaking through you
moving your tongue blasting the air through your throat
choking up
keep speaking

speak up poor soul
understanding just how weak your words are
how wasted and numb
you are
all for a loaf of bread

with your head still bowed talk proudly
like a rich man content
out loud or in whispers
to yourself and other selves

by Vladimir Druk
translated by Lev Fridman

     from the book “Alef–Bet. Forms, Numbers and Nominations”

the bad student in the back row
cranes his neck trying to make out the writing on the blackboard

our teacher has bad handwriting
everything He writes is indecipherable
everything He says is drowned out by the noise
of the morning news

the news greets you in your bathrobe
defenseless
you are looking for your glasses
to be able to see the unexplainable

the radio strings letters into words
the din builds

embrace me
put your hand on my heart
I will be Your antenna

tuned to the waves of war
the wind died down and the night brightened up

a ladder leaning against the sky
teach me how to use it

they say that in a world of flying towers
it is easy to reach up and touch the stars

but at a good school the overachievers are not well liked

by Vladimir Druk
translated by Alex Halberstadt 

Vitebsk, 1914
in memory of Mark Chagall

fate’s snotty armored train
bursts into someone’s comfort zone
pushing their barrels through the slits
the fighters shoot and croon.

no use hiding behind the cupboard
when they’ve got you by the collar
shelves fly apart
and blood trickles onto sand.

bang! bang! like in a jar of lollipops
everything rattles, everyone rattles!

and in the window’s bargain bin
the moon goes through its quarter phases
its crumbs and scraps
peer through a hole in the drapes.

the weebles race down the alley
their faces buried in mommy’s lap
and rosy milk, familiar, light,
plows down sleepy veinlike streets.
foam flies up like a flag,
a child, or the laughter of
tubercular violin strings.

on fire, the pregnant woman
presses her belly to the sky,
a beautiful and bloody cab driver
follows with a chisel.
bed sheets and empty bottles
dangle from the electric gun-sights.
the little soldier couldn’t escape
the Italian lady at the station,
and now he’s standing guard in long johns.
the crone chews onions for her supper,
the old man puts on a humped cap,
while the cat, deep in thought,
ties himself into a maritime knot
but can’t.

ecstatic, the physics teacher
rubs together wires,
the school inspector’s uniform
sticks out three arms,

and the torn-off head
flies through the air,
no longer right.

from belt buckles with pencil mustaches
to thighs with languid eyes,
a whisper sweeps the classroom:
“here comes the electricity!”

here comes the electricity
running through wires and tangled branches,
a magnet that will suck the twilight from
above schoolgirls and schoolboys.

bang! bang! like in a jar of lollipops
everything rattles, everyone rattles!

oh!—what is this I see—could it be
awkward Dora by the fence?
thinking about this, that, and the other,
she spies the writing on the fence and
scratches a fist with her beard.
she spies the writing on the fence and
with a gasp,
stoops for a closer look at
the word “idiot” “smart.”

…the shack’s plywood walls fall
into tall grass with a silent shudder
as the swollen sound of
a harmonica slices the air.

destiny, a bloated, obese woman,
watches me through the window.
a domino tile, with a clinking sound,
walks ceremoniously past her.

a sweaty cab driver, as if in a nightmare,
sleeps inside a reflecting samovar.
it’s dark.  the night barely-visible.
the moon is branded with the window’s cross.