Though born in Odesa (in 1889)
to a Ukrainian father and Russian mother, Anna Akhmatova is considered a
Russian/Soviet poet. The family moved to a suburb of Saint Petersburg before
she was a year old, and as far as I know she never returned to Ukraine. Her
poems are vivid and powerful, and she was condemned and censored by Stalinist
authorities for them.
As I have written many times,
the outbreak of the First World War was a huge tear in the fabric of Western
history. Akhmatova captures this in today’s entry for National Poetry Month, “July,
1914”. She certainly called it right.
We don’t yet know whether the
current war in Ukraine will prove to be another great chasm in civilization. I
wonder what the poets are saying?
“July, 1914”
1
The air reeks with smolder. For all of four
weeks
Dry peat in the bogs has been burning.
Even the birdsong is mute and discreet,
And the aspen tree’s tremble lacks yearning.
Sunlight that sears speaks of Godly disfavor,
Not a sprinkle of rainfall since Easter.
In the courtyard alone stands a querulous raver,
A one-legged transient preacher.
“Gruesome and hideous days are at hand;
The earth will be rife with fresh graves;
Pestilence, famine will lay waste our land,
Eclipses and earthquakes, pandemics in waves.
But the Foul Fiend who revels in earthly
distress
Will not bring our homeland disaster.
The Mother of God in her grace and largesse
Will shelter us under Her veil alabaster.”
2
Smoldering juniper wafts its sweet scent
From woods that are burning nearby.
Soldiers’ wives tearfully weep and lament,
Widows-to-be raise a long keening cry.
Priests chanted evensong vigils of prayer,
For the dry earth was gasping with thirst.
Trampled-down fields lay wreathed in despair,
As a red-shrouded mist hung dispersed.
Low-hanging clouds in a sky dire and vacant,
A praying voice softly declaimant,
“They’ve ravaged Thy body so pure and complaisant,
And now they cast lots for Thy raiment.”
Translated
by U.R. Bowie
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