There’s ice above me. There’s ice below. Should I drill upward? Should I bust the floor? Up, up, of course! I hope, therefore I float, Expecting foreign visas at my door. I must break out, escape this icy chamber. I’m sweating like a farmer at the plow. I will return just like those ships, remember? And bring you all my poems with a bow. I’m less than fifty, but the time is short. By you and God protected, life and limb. I have a song or two to sing before the Lord. I have a way to make my peace with him.
© Vadim Astrakhan. Translation, 2013
© Vadim Astrakhan. Performance, 2020