Some of these poems I’ve already translated for previous issues of 7uapoems. Some have alternative translations published in books. But today, I wanted to put them together: Christmas-themed poems, written by Ukrainian poets currently serving in the armed forces.
Serhii Rubnikovich
Previously published in Issue 7.
nativity play
the outposts on Christmas
reported thus
the astrologist walks in front
with a night vision on his helmet
behind him three kings with gifts
each carries a tin of ammo
an angel with a red cross on his sleeve
two sheperdesses with machine guns
to herd the flock from the flanks
the devil with a hell pipe
the jew with grenades in his pockets
clucking at every step
the cossack with callsign cossack
Herod in white ghillie suit
even though there is no snow
if friendly raise a hand
the radio coughs
that's all of those who made it
there is also a death behind us
the astrologist reports
but she isn't visible
neither with heat vision
nor with night sight
but you can hear her whistle
and her smellYaryna Chornohuz
Other Yaryna’s poems were previously published in Issue 4.
[the last Christmas]
dawn breaks in a borderland: nobody’s sides of a gray street
three kings walk by
they have already given all their gifts to the gray dawn of the fire pause
Christmas is what was once
amid the fake calm of two enemy sides
I feel like my heart is too much
you and I have woven a patchwork quilt of our hearts
hybrid war silently walks on it
its heels are deep and sharp
not Achilles’
I can’t get away from the pain
Kyiv is far along the road west
like a crescent moon
which you are afraid to lose it in the depth of the night
and stop wanting to return home
its, subdued and fouled by the time between,
golden glow
is there somewhere
you might wait for years to hear your one whistle
on this side of the Don
I don’t want to return home alive
I hear a dear voice calling to me above the river
“let me perish
we’ll see each other again
at least in the sky
if not on this earth.”
(From the book “[dasein: defence of presence]”)Pavlo Matyusha
* * * Everything falls apart, even Christmas Eve doesn’t know whose it is today. Only summaries, like endless rivers: summaries from front lines, summaries from detachments, summaries from schools and preschools on children’s progress (like reports from the heavens). Who can read them all, understand, remember? The children are far, progress is far. The wounded and the killed are near. Some didn’t even reach the trenches — died in his military bed two days before the mission. They say: a midlife crisis. They say: high blood pressure. They say all kinds of things. There will be no Christmas Eve for the newly dead. There will be for us, like a second chance at a long jump. Run-up lasting for centuries — since Semenko and Zerov — now is the moment to take off from the foul line and leap past the greying winter. Where the dawn breaks in Kyiv. Where we are walking, holding fingertips. Where Trukhaniv island calls us into its embrace, us, rogues, thirsty for a kiss. (Original)
Artur Dron
Previously published in Issue 2.
* * * "on 25th and on 7th" - alternative dates for Christmas (Dec 25th, like Europe, which Ukraine started to observe recently, or Jan 7th, imposed by Russia) We argued again when we should meet you. But, you know, both on 25th and on 7th, Bethlehem was shelled and bombed. There is no crib, no lambs, no perinatal center, no kindergarten, no playground. When you grow up and learn to talk, tell your mother to tell mine how she can live through all of this.
Ihor Mitrov
Other of Ihor’s poems were previously published in Issue 5.
at Christmas we weren’t shelled by artillery nothing but small arms except for a grenade launcher spitting overripe cucumbers metal seeds into the limbs of our scouts two of them brought their stigmata to the evacuation point on their own another one we had to carry also a rocket launcher also a mortar also a tank tearing the forest apart but it missed us since childhood I’ve never liked cucumbers in festive salads (Original)
Olena Herasymyuk
Other Olena’s poems were published previously in Issue 3.
Christmas melody The heaviest suitcases on those train stations are Ukrainians’ Full of flashbacks, hard decisions, compromises, fury and love, silence and memory, the remains of yesterday’s life, shattered by strikes. The enemy strikes, like a clock, twelve times tonight. One — knocks out the windows. Two — knocks out the door. Three — breaks all the cups and plates of the christmas feast, topples candles and a straw didukh dishes are falling, tears are spilling from pots. Four — breaks all the tables, chairs, and other furniture, their legs twisted like a grapevine in a storm. Five — the sound caught up, strokes heads, like brass bells. Bammm. Bammmmm. Bammmmmmm. Six — falls the snow of ash, gunpowder and plaster, clogs your mouth and nose, you can’t breathe in, can’t breathe out. Lungs stop still, like startled hares. Seven — drips from ears a single note of a melody mine is “mi”, dragging like on an untuned school piano which you didn’t want to play, while the teacher hit your hands. “Mi” sounds like “MiG”, I hate it. Today I hate everything that sounds like war. Which note do you hear? Pick it with a crooked, broken finger. Eight — now you can see but you’d be better off never hearing those screams (only after, you understand that it is yourself). Nine — a bit more... Not much left, you soothe yourself, curling into a shred of hope that there would be no repeat strike. The air raid alert tolls for us all. Ten — it seems the three kings are coming for you with a spinal board, which means you might survive. They do everything they can under the circumstances. Eleven — the star sparkles. A spotlight searching for drones will stay lit till morning. Twelve — God is born in the cellar of a hospital. He makes his first breath. And lets out a long, unstoppable cry. . (Original)
Vasyl (Vasek) Dukhnovskii
Other Vasyl’s poems were published previously in Issue 8.
|snows and deserts| under the first snow the last homeless falls asleep with a tired eye he glances as a light rain turns into a blizzard in the streetlamps’ light a speckled dance begins and autumn ends for good so begins the final winter begins the absolute winter the total winter pervasive insurmountable the homeless remembers what the geography teacher a solid bald bearded man in a reindeer sweater more than thirty years ago said about deserts there are not only hellishly hot ones but also hellishly cold ones perfectly white as the coat of a doctor who announces an incurable illness the wind announces an incurable winter the last winter (for somebody) (for this homeless, for sure) don’t smear yourself with tears he doesn’t need your snot your pity your grief he doesn’t need either he is not a fool such as you and me he knows well that one should not cry especially in winter predatory venomous winter almost primordial winter when every tear is counted by a greedy stockkeeper there is nothing sad either the one who understands what he is doing unlike you and me knows there is no death more beautiful than to dissolve in a dessert children in kindergartens start to memorize their carols they might learn them by christmas by christmas, they might live 2025 (Original)