Writing Poetry with Putin
By Sara Robinson

This time of year the black flies are a distraction.
They emerge from the forest floor, are
restless, and don’t appreciate their evolutionary
history. Better to find a mossier spot, perhaps
with better views of the valleys and more
open vistas beyond the mountains to the sea.

The wind coming in from the west doesn’t
give us the sweetness we thought we
deserved so by moving our blanket to the
slope side facing Balaklava we might catch
a friendlier, warmer breeze, one whose

promise of fertility and longevity offer
up perfect stanzas for our anticipated
listeners. We can create words of love,
inspiration, dedication, wealth, and
even a call to arms in the name of our

muses which we know are found in
the folk lore museums of Kiev and Kharkov.
We can take our words, partition them over
and over again until we have the right emphasis
and reverence to proper metrical positions.

We can write in the best style of our homeland
giving into reminiscence of white, stout houses
along winding rivulets of waters which feed
our cows, our wheat, our children, and our
beets. Astride our horses, with our chests bare,

panting, we feel evening turn from warmness
to proudest of dusks into tantamount
cold arrival of darkness. We don’t need our coats.
We liberate our own heat from the satisfaction
that we have done all this, our best writing,
our proudest poetry, for the heavy-nailed boot.