THE DAY BOMBING OF UKRAINE BEGAN, 2/24/22

by Julie Bolt

The old Kiev Restaurant on 7th Street in Greenwich Village; Allen Ginsberg and Quentin Crisp dining there.

It was always a point of debate:

Veselka, Kiev, or Ukrainian National Home

Veselka was busy and bright, 

Kiev was for neighborhood regulars early or late at night, 

UNH was to time travel into a Ukrainian  private club from another age

I loved them all, but especially Kiev 

For the best comfort food in Greenwich Village

And largest portions and lowest prices

And latest hours, the most tolerant waiters

However it was hard to decide whether to order a combo blintz and pierogi platter 

or assorted pierogi platter 

or potato pancakes

Real first world dilemma 

Ideally friends would share what they had

And then there was the challah of clouds with butter

And oh how the boys had crushes on the Ukrainian waitresses

And the head waiter flirted with my mom, cheeks flushed like borsht

And I went so often they sometimes gave me a free cherry blintz!

I knew through my Bulgarian pen pal how oppressive the Soviet Union was

I don’t remember if I thought much about whether the Kiev staff escaped oppression

But I remember that December 26, 1991 was a great day

I had just moved to Philadelphia then

So I could not celebrate at Kiev

I probably just ate a vegetable hoagie

Gorbachev had the map of peace on his head unlike Putin’s face of war

After Philly, I moved to New Mexico, Arizona and California

In 2005, I returned to NYC, ready to feast on Kiev’s sauerkraut pierogis slathered in apple sauce and fried onions

New ownership resulted in Ukrainian-Asian fusion, and small portions, 

aspiring to expensive tastes 

Sadly, Veselka acquired long NYU lines, 

So I decamped to The Ukrainian National Home

It wasn’t long before Kiev shut its doors forever

I will always mourn the closing of Kiev

I hope the owners did not miss the entire bright window of Ukraine’s democracy 

Where are they now?

What are they thinking today

as people flee Kyiv 

as Ukraine is bombed 

as Putin says the dissolution of the Soviet Union that we all lived through is a myth 

Our friends are dying in the crossfires of lies

The blue sky grows dark 

The yellow flowers burn

Julie Bolt is an associate professor of literature and writing at Bronx Community College of the City University of New York. Recently, she was awarded an Andrew W. Mellon Fellowship for Transformative Learning in the Humanities. Her poems have appeared in Thieves Jargon, Slow Trains, The Red River Review, Poetic Diversity, Syntax, Shot Glass Journal and Home Planet News, amongst others. Her book is Border Pedagogy for Democratic Practice.

PRAVDA

by Kelly Jadon

Nicholas Roerich, "Guests from Overseas"

Awaking in spring, gaunt from nursing cubs
in darkness, alone, in her den
So is Mother Russia with Ukraine, Georgia
buffers which she keeps within reach

Her snowy fur hiding blackened skin
for warmth against ancient frigid tundra
Crossed by Vikings, Rus', a brutal heritage
ancestral blood violented by Mongols

Hunting hares across drifts
she returns with raw prey
offerings of peace to cubs
Feeding rebellious spirits within her states

Drawing her babes outward,
she nudges them to follow
in her footsteps they plod,
Unbalanced, weak, young
not fully independent democracies

To the sea’s ice
she dives fishing
gazing into air holes of whiskered seals
her territory
As is Kiev, taken by Grand Prince of Rus'
Oleg

Swimming miles across open waters
she leads growing cubs
in her wake
Old Soviet thinking controlling masses
hammer and sickle
Berlin wall, Afghanistan, Georgia—
all unforgotten

Two years cubs follow the mother
learning her hunting and survival skills
As Viking thoughts prepare for Mongol behaviors
the Rus'
bear witness
truth of who they truly are


Kelly Jadon is a graduate of Spring Arbor University and holds a degree in English with a focus on poetry.  She is a teacher, poet, and writer.  Her poem "To Taste The Oil" was recently published by The Voices Project and was featured at the University of Colorado "Eye Contact" event as an audible poem.  Her poem "the snow pile" was published at Everyday Poets (1/2014).  "Destination Hamamatsu" to be published in Pavilion Magazine (Fall 2014).

UKRAINE: NOTES, 2014

by Kathleen Sousa Capps

@anadoluimages: A piano painted the colours of Ukrainian national flag at Independence Square in the capital Kiev.
Image source: Veooz 360

If I knew how to play
I’d set up a grand piano
In Kiev
In Independence
Square
Right now
While it’s winter
Though each note hang on the air
Like an icicle suspended
From the frame of a burnt out bus
It would still be carried with passion
Wrung from the heart of a nightingale
I’d play every Handel and Mozart Requiem,
Every song that blows out a candle
Every thought that says THIS IS NOT A COUP
This is a cry for human rights, to let us out of this
Dictatorship, this collaboration with fascism
To deny freedom of choice, to deny free trade,
Intellect, spirit, Ukraine and Europe.
Right now
While Kiev is burning
In flames
And riot police claim lives
And protestors toss Molotov cocktails
If I could I’d sit in front of a grand piano
And each moment would pray for peace


Kathleen Sousa Capps holds a PhD in English from University of Oregon (1998).  Publications in literary and academic journals, including Paideuma.   Dissertation topic: Image Trouble: Pound’s People-Making as Visual Discourse.  Trying to find an agent/publisher for her novel, Blackberry Woman.  Because Kathleen is hearing impaired and blind, her father forbade her to learn to play the piano; he said it was a waste of time.  And college is no place for women.  (That’s what he said.)