Friday, February 24, 2023

A Room of My Own: News after News Tanka

written on the first anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine

news after news
of death from the war
an ocean away
a boy's stare at the camera
interpellating me


Added: Protests marking the first anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine

Russian Embassy (in Berlin)
the T-72 tank covered 
with rust and moss

an old man 
blasts a siren at 3 am
Russian Embassy (in Oslo)

a skull 
on the blood-stained cake 
Russian Embassy (in Belgrade)

Russian Embassy (in London)
a river of paint spilled 
in blue and yellow

the Eiffel Tower
lit in blue and yellow
Russian Embassy (in Paris)


Added:

one year on
in the world of snow on snow
blue and yellow flowers 
at Taras Shevchenko's statue
in Saint Petersburg

FYI: Taras Shevchenko was the best known 19th century Ukrainian poet ad fighter for the independence of Ukraine and the freedom of all mankind. Of many monuments/statues built for him around the world, The first one in Russia was unveiled in Petrograd (Saint Petersburg) on December 1, 1918.

The inscription says: "To the great Ukrainian poet-peasant T. G. Shevchenko (1814 - 1861) from the great Russian nation."

And ABC News, Feb. 24: Russians mark Ukraine war anniversary with flowers, arrests:

Russians in Moscow and other cities brought flowers to Ukrainian poets and held one-person pickets with antiwar slogans to mark the first anniversary of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.


Added:

first loud boom ...
one year on, snowy silence
in this condo


Added:

smell of sunshine
the school playground a few feet
from bomb craters


Added:

from afar
the air raid sirens
in morning chill
a teen touches a photo
on the Memorial Wall

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