A poem by our reader the "White Buffalo Woman"
What happened to Russia?
The Russia of 1915
The Russia of Akhmatova
And of A. Pushkin?
Wherefore art Thou,
Russia,
That Andrei Rublev
Did paint?
The Russia that was
Holy. Russia
Of many a Saint.
Methodius and Cyril
Miracles of Nick,
Of all America
And Siberia,
Veniaminov's pick.
Wherefore to that dragon
Didst Thou even so succumb,
In 1917 with good
Intention did become
A Revolution set aflame,
But prisoner of Pride
Even as Stalin
Bled you,
To make the
World survive.
Wherefore art Thou
Russia, Home
Of Philby, Burgess
And Maclean.
Ally of ours
(US and Britain Too)
To hold the
Wolf at bay.
When we needed you
Russia,
You had the World
To gain.
There was a way
To find detente
And needs for us
To woo.
But now,
Its Berezovsky
And Khodorkovsky too.
No Saints,
To set a cage
(Of lesser fools in Play.)
What demogoguery
Does reign
That spins adrift
Our worlds today.
As even now
The shift
Of our own pride
Subsumes,
All that democracy
Did unfurl; into the
Waiting gloom.
Like Russia
In 1915
Akhmatova on
A bridge.
Today not Trotsky's
But another,
Blacker Bridge
Does gleam.
Faces save one,
(Black), unkown
To all.
Another perching demon,
For Andrei Rublev
Does call.
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(c) 2006 Tillamook Potlatch. All Rights Reserved. White Buffalo Woman.
Is this a poem because it is arranged in quatrains(more or less)? It.. doesn't sound nice.. rhymes pop up rarely and irregularly.. and many things you mention provoke rebuttal.
Are you aware that "wherefore art thou" means "why are you", not "where are you"? Eg, "Wherefore art thou Romeo? [note: no comma]....Deny thy father and refuse thy name, or I'll no longer be a Capulet." Just checking.