Codrii

Under the white sun,
The centuries-old villages lie in slumber
Breeding multitudes, alien to my frets.
They, from the lively festivities of the past,
Have vanished into the void.
O savage kolkhoz, thou shrieks of history
Soaring over clusters of houses with barns,
And the frozen wells.

I am in a land, where no stranger wanders,
Where the causes of death are trivialised,
And spring dreams lull the senses,
Blurring the boundary between the unknown and the present.

Despite each fork diverging to a monastery or a winery,
Despite the fierce wolfdog guarding the corn store,
Despite the tender gaze of Jesus elucidating the path,
I remain as still as an icy pond.

Codru, they call it,
The nest of squirrels and owls, of deers and foxes.
Scattering, as from the sonority of its liveness,
Of the valley, to which the immensity
Has far devoured their bleating.
Scattering, as from the sacred grace of its woodland,
Of the dark trunks, to which each woody crevice
Has embodied the lifelessness.
Scattering, as from the odourlessness of its twigs,
Of the wuthering clouds, to which the bitter fog
Has hugged the earth.

Amid the maple trees in their finery
Adorned with snow,
Rooted deep in the frozen soil,
I am in transitional hues of brown and white.

In this starkness,
I lock eyes with the flurry of a deer family;
Hopping in a sequence to the other side
Through the swaying, tangled branches,
Saluting each one
As if frosty spirits show their trail.
I allow nature to offer more ephemeral moments:
Distant howls of foxes
Dark cracks in barks
Rustle of leaf litter
Too-wit too-woo!
The true form of bareness!

12.2023