This past week, many of my waking thoughts have strayed towards Ukraine, as I am sure is true for many. Between fear of nuclear threats from Russia, the danger of totalitarianism in Europe, and moving portraits of everyday citizens taking up arms, international consciousness is riveted to this disturbing development.
For this reason, I would like to share “[So much joy! We have come as close as we dared, Lord],” written by the Ukrainian poet Ilya Kaminsky and featured in our Spring 2005 issue. While Kaminsky’s timely poem “We Lived Happily During the War” has gone viral for obvious and important reasons, we would be remiss to ignore his other works. In particular, this poem calls back to another Ukrainian-born poet, Paul Celan. Though the happenstance of Celan’s birth is often forgotten since he wrote in German, Kaminsky’s poem draws Celan’s “Tenebrae” into conversation through a direct address to God.
[So much joy! We have come as close as we dared, Lord]
Ilya Kaminsky
So much joy! We have come as close as we dared, Lord,
Let us wash our faces in the wind and forget the swift shapes of affection.
Let the pregnant woman hold something of clay in her hand
for the secret of patience is more patience.
Let her man kneel on the roof, clearing his throat,
he who loved roofs, tonight and tonight, making love to her and her forgetting,
a man with a fast heartbeat, a woman dancing with a broom, uneven breath.
Let them kiss your forehead. Let them borrow the light from the blind.
What is silence? Something of the sky in us. There will be evidence, there will be evidence.
Giving voice to consonants that rise, with no protection but each other's ears,
we are on our bellies in this silence, Lord.
