​Poems by Iryna Shuvalova 

​if I am not being killed
do I have the right
to talk with those who are being killed
as an equal
do I have the right to hurt
if I’m not wounded
or complain
if I haven’t suffered losses
do I have the right
to sleepless nights
if sirens
do not wail here
now death’s proximity
lies on the table between us
like a loaf of bread
with a knife baked into it
if I am not being killed
what can I say
to those
who are
whose language has been cracked open by death     
so it no longer resembles itself
now –
we no longer speak
the same language
so
if I am not being killed
do I have the right
to want to hold you
as tightly as
I used to before
when neither of us were being killed.
 
Translated by Virlana Tkacz and Wanda Phipps
 
Previously published at Apofenie.com

 
 
 
8. while you sleep
 
it’s easier for me when you sleep
because it seems to me that while you sleep
you can’t die
 
after all, asleep,
you’re already so close
to the other world
where there’s no shooting anymore
 
and also because while you sleep
I’m not asleep
and so in some sense
I’m standing guard
 
if not guarding you
(you’re so far away)
then this day
this light
 
six hours ahead
I carry this morning sun like a banner
that waves
 
over the land of the living
and the land of the dead
 
their border guards
have hung their rifles in the trees
and lie down lazily in the grass
 
these two countries
have not yet severed
diplomatic ties
 
Translated by Amelia Glaser and Yuliya Ilchuk

Previously published at LitHub.com

​Iryna Shuvalova is a poet, translator, and scholar. She holds an MA in Comparative Literature from Dartmouth College and a PhD in Slavonic Studies from the University of Cambridge. She has authored five award-winning collections of poetry, including Pray to the Empty Wells (2019) available in English, and co-edited the first anthology of queer writing in Ukraine. Her latest collection stoneorchardwoods (kaminsadlis, 2020) was named poetry book of the year in Ukraine. Her work has been translated into 15 languages. A member of PEN Ukraine, she lives and works between Kyiv, Ukraine, and Nanjing, China.

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