ISSUE: Fall 2011
threadbare sky thrusting a finger through it the light cracks
even bones there are rarefied barely holding history
barely an upright carriage the rain through july
through all ages the same karma to watch the sky
with a rat’s eyes this generation of grey corpuscles
stale air in the city’s archives while they would gnaw out
the tunnel to the next life rats’ eyes overgrown the women
dried up no game one-way traffic to the end
of winter until the snow on crosses on hinges
on the grey corpuscle non-euclidic time the kitchens
the lamp of soviet times the non-cartesian mind a few
crumbs left dumb it used to jump with its grey tail
over the belmont forests over the hills of rokantiskes cemetery
not touching the dead as much as i remember there was nothing
as much as i forget it was under the kitchen under the apple wine
under ashes of prima rats and only rats gnawing the dictionary only that
—Translated from Lithuanian by Kerry Shawn Keys and the author
