Funeral Services
“he’d be so perfect / if you could only convince yourself that/ he’s just a terrorist, not a human being”
Ukraine
[Now we remember: janitors and the night-sellers of bread]
“we got to soak in the rain/ on cars/ loaded with the unemployed/ like magazines with cartridges”
[someone stands between you and death-but]
“my heart whispers: Death, he hasn’t ripened yet/ he’s still green, nothing in his life has been/ sweeter than unwashed strawberries”
[we swallowed an air like earth]
“some of us exhaled cherry pits/ some bullets”
[people carry explosives around the city]
“people carry explosives around the city/ in plastic shopping bags and little suitcases”
[Buried in a human neck, a bullet looks like an eye, sewn in]
“But the children feel as strong as their machinery,/ mass-produced, with plenty of seamstresses for repairing:”
[The whole soldier doesn’t suffer-]
“just dreadful losses,/ just the day with a dented helmet,/ just God, who doesn’t protect.”
[This is a post on Facebook, and this, a block post in the East]
“I’ll make you a gift: a camouflage case for your tablet;/ time is earwax, peddled in alleyways, under the table.”
[When you clean your weapon]
“When you dig trench after trench/ When you dig this precious this hateful earth by handfuls/ Every other handful reaches your soul”
Halyna Kruk
HALYNA KRUK was born in Lviv in 1974. She is a poet, writer of fiction and a scholar of Ukrainian medieval literature. She authored four books of poetry and collected some of Ukraine’s top awards for young poets. She also writes books for children and young adults. In 2003 Kruk was the recipient of the …
Boris Khersonsky
BORIS KHERSONSKY was born in Chernivtsi in 1950. He studied medicine in Ivano-Frankivsk and Odessa. He initially worked as a neurologist, before becoming a psychologist and psychiatrist at the Odessa regional psychiatric hospital. In 1996 Khersonsky took on an appointment at the department of psychology at Odessa National University, before becoming chair of the department …
Lyudmyla Khersonska
LYUDMYLA KHERSONSKA was born in Tiraspol, Moldova, in 1964. She is the author of two books of poetry, Vse svoi, named one of the ten best poetry books of 2011, and Tyl’naia-litsevaia (2015). Her work has received several literary awards, and she has been named laureate and winner of the Voloshin competition. Her poems appear in many …
Aleksandr Kabanov
ALEKSANDR KABANOV was born in Kherson in 1968. He studied journalism at the Kyiv State University. An author of eleven books of poetry and numerous publications in major Russian literary journals, Kabanov is said to be one of the leading Russian-language poets of his generation. He has been awarded a number of prestigious literary prizes, …
Borys Humenyuk
BORYS HUMENYUK was born in Ostriv, Ternopil oblast, in 1965. He is a poet, writer, and journalist. He has taken an active part in Ukraine’s Revolution of Dignity of 2013. Since 2014, he has been involved in the anti-terrorist operation in the Ukrainian Donbas region. He now serves in a self-organized military unit composed mainly …
Serhiy Zhadan
SERHIY ZHADAN was born in Starobilsk, Luhansk oblast, in 1974. He is a Ukrainian poet, fiction writer, essayist, and translator. He has published over two dozen books, including the poetry collections Psychedelic Stories of Fighting and Other Bullshit (2000), Ballads of the War and Reconstruction (2000), The History of Culture at the Beginning of the Century (2003), Lili Marlen (2009), and Life of Maria (2016). …
Died of Old Age
“Olha was pregnant/ Serhiy was drunk/ and Sonya was only three/ they all perished, too/ and people said, they died of old age” | by Lyuba Yakimchuk
Lyuba Yakimchuk
LYUBA YAKIMCHUK was born in Pervomaisk, Luhansk oblast, in 1985. She is a Ukrainian poet, screenwriter, and journalist. She is the author of several full-length poetry collections, including Like FASHION and Apricots of Donbas, and the film script for The Building of the Word. Yakimchuk’s awards include the International Slavic Poetic Award and the …
Ostap Slyvynsky
OSTAP SLYVYNSKY was born in Lviv in 1978. He is a poet, translator, essayist, and literary critic. He authored four books of poetry. Hewas awarded the Antonych Literary Prize (1997), the Hubert Burda Prize for young poets from Eastern Europe (2009), and the Kovaliv Fund Prize (2013). Slyvynsky coordinated the International Literary Festival at the …
Kateryna Kalytko
KATERYNAKALYTKO was born in Vinnytsia in 1982. She is a writer and translator. She had published six collections of poetry and two collections of short stories. Her poems have appeared in numerous anthologies of Ukrainian literature, and her works have been translated into English, Polish, German, Hebrew, Russian, Armenian, Italian, and Serbian. Kalytko is an …
Svetlana Lavochkina
SVETLANA LAVOCHKINA is a Ukrainian-born novelist, poet, and poetry translator, now residing in Leipzig, Germany. Her work has been widely published in the U.S. and Europe, appearing in AGNI, New Humanist, POEM, Witness, Straylight, Circumference, Superstition Review, Fairlight Books, Drunken Boat, and elsewhere. Her novella, Dam Duchess, was chosen runner-up …