Two Poems

A Gathering of Lozhky

hanging from the edge of a teacup
sugar-coated   under the shadow
of a dusty samovar

or a wedding gift
silver & resting on a bride’s lips
promising wealth    protection    porridge

or buried beside the closed eyes
of my heritage    along with the utterance
of ‘your ration’

or carved from crimean wood    ornate
as a goldfinch    used to separate
newborns from mothers

when a knife is deemed too violent
o babusi    i have gathered you here as spoons
you are what keeps the dead feeding

Babusya’s Arms

remember the winter i fumbled my thumb
under the knife    spurted a mistake    red & obvious

i am nothing like her    babusya inna expertly
chops potatoes for borscht    her muscles defined

like a cheap car    years of baby-bearing    body-burying
she’s carried so much    remember    outside the hospital

how she held a plastic chair high above her head
threatened to break the glass doors    after we were made

to wait    an hour in the snow    i had never seen a wound
frozen    wondered which animal would lick at it

if we were left any longer    & then the nurses
rushed us in    babusya let the chair fall with a bone-

snap crunch    a deer scattered away in the distance