Gray and Blue
you some clothes. We chose something blue and gray,
but you kept standing there, head hanging, saying: «it won’t do,
won’t do.» And, seeing that my hands too have become all wrinkled,
I suddenly felt, how could these hands lead you to accept a
simple bolt of cloth? They just can’t.
There’s much shame in this world, but perhaps the least known
is to age before your mother’s eyes.
This piece was originally published in American Poetry Review and has been reprinted here with permission of the author.
Anzhelina Polonskaya was born in Malakhovka, a small town near Moscow. Since 1998, she has been a member of the Moscow Union of Writers and in 2003, Polonskaya became a member of the Russian PEN-centre. In 2004 an English version of her book, entitled A Voice, appeared in the acclaimed “Writings from an Unbound Europe” series at Northwestern University Press. This book was shortlisted for the 2005 Corneliu M Popescu Prize for European Poetry in Translation. Her work has appeared in Boulevard , The Iowa Review, The Massachusetts Review, Prairie Schooner, Barrow Street, The Journal, Poetry Daily, AGNI, New England Review, and The Literary Review, among other publications. Her book Paul Klee’s Boat was shortlisted for the 2014 Best Translated Book Award and for the 2014 PEN Award for Poetry in Translation.
Andrew Wachtel is the president of the American University of Central Asia in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. He has translated poetry and prose from Russian, Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian, Bulgarian and Slovenian.
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