Memories of rural days
In Soviet Ukraine
Keep bubbling to the surface
Of deep dark waters,
The lake of slow forgetting.
My sister and I labouring in the fields,
Struggling to keep to quotas,
Our backs red raw from the summer sun,
Our fingers ripped and blistered.
We slept in a hut no bigger than the shed
Where father stored his seeds and garden tools
Back home in North West London.
My home - not hers. / Separated as infants,
Raised apart for some unexplained reasons.
I lived as an only child in post war England, -
Marina far away, close to the Black Sea coast.
She spoke to the farmers
In day to day Ukrainian.
I made do with hand signs,
Plus one or two plain words.
That was long ago, in the days of Comrade Krushchev,
Six months - maybe less, before the Cuban Crises.
Tonight, six decades on, the tanks of Putin`s army
Have been sent in to annihilate Ukraine,
Force this beauteous land to become a Russian fiefdom,
A project only Putin understands.
And tonight, in rain drenched London, I remember Mariupol,
The white apartment blocks close to the city centre
That we drove by in a lorry stacked with grain,
Sweat pouring from our faces in the rag packed oily cab.
We dared not think that Moscow would one day blitz those streets;
Young mothers of lost children screaming out their pain.
Slava Ukraini. Slava Ukraini.
Your golden domes out dazzle
The early morning sun
With the light of the new fire
That proclaims the resurrection,
Such glory cannot now be overcome.
Trevor John Karsavin Potter.
February 27th. 28th. - March 5th. - 6th. 2022.
