By Volya Hapeyeva.
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it’s not easy being a street
especially at that place
where the crosswalk lies
where
horizontal
meets
vertical
humans and machines
sometimes beasts
dogs and doves
and wheels − the new ones for a few hundred dollars
or the old ones inherited from people born in 1930
when i was little
i always got the two mixed up − vertical and horizontal
every time i said the words
i pictured the horizon
horizon − that’s like a line
behind which the sea should instantly appear
and disappear again
this street − me
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i examined their bodies with my mouth
and forgot that i had already had some
that i have to breathe and eat
that i am not them
belong to other senses
Only when their names got all jumbled
did i open up
water taps
windows wide
dictionaries
word files
i even called embassies
to hear that everything was the same and in its place
In our relationship we had no understanding for eyes
only hearing only forms
touch and shape weight rhythm and motion
hard kisses of emphasis embraces of sound
dances of intonation in empty stations
from which they departed
having left behind
lipstick stains on my cheek
a smile will keep for a while on my mouth
i guess that’s how a clown feels after the audience leaves
sometimes it’s hard to believe the wind’s nothing but a difference in pressure
sometimes a conjunction is more than just a way to connect words
never ever will i overturn life from the word death
overturn the word girl from my own body
blood bakes on my breasts
bakes hard and crumbles
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as long as you forget my name
day by day one letter at a time
like no other body
will i lie
under the stretched electricity wires
on the edges
of an all forgiving power plant
and like no other bird
grasping for the naked wires
under your left eye
the muscle contracting
to find out
what an instant
really is
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i kiss the wind with wild abandon
for dessert i order day with caramel
i longed to marry a shadow − so what
even your shadow was enough
it’s just that your language
lacked a future
and so I was cursed to remain
in some form of past perfect
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for in the your hand
months drifted warm palm of
my breasts boats of the
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read the snow
till the very end
erase all the errors
until the snow melting
stills your thirst emancipated winter
on the field’s edge red birds settle
loosen up the earth like the knot in your throat
but however you swallow
i cannot save those blue lips
i am that unstressed syllable
to be more exact a concrete feminine noun with Ƨ in the stem
and to decline me …
− what might i show you?
− these candies …
the plural always helps
and since so many words
are not written together
i give myself a hyphen
under my coat i bear
bouquets of red and yellow
soft signs
against your hardness
though
you are no exception
and i am not the rule
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when you’re a tree
and the wind has abandoned you
you can stand for centuries untouched
what are birds to you their summer songs
when you
are a tree
abandoned by the wind
Translated for the first time into English by Chris Michalski, exclusively for Maintenant
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Volya Hapeyeva (1982) was born in Minsk, Belarus. She graduated from Minsk State Linguistic University with an MA in Linguistics (MSLU) and Sociology (Gender Studies, EHU-International, Vilnius, Lithuania ). She then finished her PhD studies in Comparative Linguistics. A writer of poetry, prose, plays, her books include Reconstruction of the Sky (2003) and Unshaven Morning (2008). Her works have been translated into English, German, Czech, Macedonian, Polish, Lithuanian. She has also participated in a number of international literary festivals and conferences (Slovenia, Germany, Czech Republic, Lithuania).
