by Kenton Call
1995-1997
Some of you might recognize people or experiences in this collection of hack poetry from my journal. I figure that it is better to post it and let others enjoy, scoff at or wonder about the contents than to keep it locked up in a book until I die. By the way, Melcher, why haven't you got any www.russiansingles.com or www.hotseeking.com links up on the website. Now that is a resource that we can all use.
Just joking, I can see Zweifel cringing right now. Good work on the site. I hope that others will contribute. It'd be fun to see what other's impressions were of Ukraine and mission life. Maybe I'll even write up my story about spending the night with three prostitutes in Kyiv and giving them the forth discussion. Feel free to email me if you want to give me money, cuss me out or donate your beautiful sisters to me.
Flaxen Cords
I'm glad this war isn't mine.
Deluded wine drugs the mind
For thugs above the throng.
Who believes? Babushka? Dedushka?
Certainly not cool guys drunk with Priests.
Who pays for Christ's body? His blood?
His scrap of bread? His flask of kagor, church wine?
Who pays for the Golden Icon over the altar?
Is it the Mercedes license plate, "I brake for Nuns!"
parked next to the BMW licensed, "I break for prostitutes!"
Corruption pays for Christ's wine.
Suffering buys his blood.
In remembrance of his sacrifice
No income, job, bread & bottle of Vodka
To forget the dirt.
Satan's flaxen cords bind the believer,
the Priest, the thug-they're selling Christ's body-
And who's buying?
Church wine and samagon.
I'm thirsty. What are you selling?
Salvation, suffering, sin.
I'm so glad this war isn't mine!
Or is it?
There's a war going on in there.
The Beard
Who sits behind the beard?
Man or devil?
Who hears my confession?
God or man?
Apostate religion, distorted by man's
Desire or ignorance.
I want to know
Who sits behind the beard
Certainly not a protector of God's Priesthood.
So we move on.
Plach
Who is this woman crying?
Nature's condensation for the woes of the world
Hurt, hungry, dead children
Narcomaniacs, war, alcohol & tobacco.
What would she say, the crying woman?
Word's of comfort for the
Abused and abusers,
Sitting in corners under cupolas
Behind Nature's mist of tears.
Tears-She's crying tears.
Who is this women with fears?
Pure tears (without salt) she cries as millions file by
worshipping Nature's condensation.
Lament, she cries tears, cradling
The only Hope.
Six Nails
Clack, clack, clack
Time's echoes shut in
She smiled in her sunday best as we shut her in.
Locked in a box without exits
Where will she go when Christ beckons?
She'll rise, rise, rise
Rise above the echoes,
And clack, clack, clack
Of pain and trouble
And live with Christ in Joy.
Gratitude
"Can I bless my food?"
"Of course, Sasha."
Is gratitude found in empty words,
vain repetitions expressed for
bananas, oranges, Israeli kosher juice.
God forgive me.
For my "Thank ya for the grub, bless it,
In the name of selfish gluttony,
AMEN to understanding."
My stomach hurts when I think of his dumpster diet
of frost bitten apples, stale bread & pig fat.
"Thank you, God for this feast of brown apples and frozen bread.
I know you sent it to me, because you love me.
In the name of Christ, my Savior, Amen."
Gratitude Revisited
Gratitude cannot be understood from M&M's, Fanta, hot cocoa and kosher juice.
Gratitude is found in sincere prayer.
How can I learn gratitude-I'm a "snapper head."
Empty words, thoughtless expressions, Picky taste buds.
Do I need brown apples to learn this lesson?
The Daredevil
"Hurry up boys! They're showing a movie over there."
"Who called the ambulance?"
"Is he still alive?"
"He's still breathing."
He fell--9 stories.
"Why'd she tell us they're showing a movie?"
He's no daredevil.
He's a breathing dead man.
Who's going to pay his bills,
feed his hungry children, &
comfort his distraught wife?
Is he still alive-the mutant, breathing dead man?
"Boys, why didn't you talk him out of it?"
It's not our fault he couldn't pay his bills,
feed his kids, &
love his wife?
What could I do?
Materialist, selfish, ungrateful Amerikanets.
I'd've talked him out of it.
White shirt, Bass loafers, silk tie.
Sure I'd've convinced him.
Book of Mormon, black nametag.
"That's one less drunk."
That's one less Brother.
Where did we lose those thirty minutes?
Bass Loafers, Book of Mormon.
They're jumping from the roofs-
Daredevils seeking peace.
Please, help me forget the breathing dead man!
Soot Babies and Bucket Sewage
How long have they been frozen there?
laughing at the Oleg's family.
Hitler started, & Gorbachev finished their fate.
Trapped in a dormitory for miners
Life ekes from existence.
Their toilet is a bucket &
Their rug is laughing at them.
Unseen sounds.
Water's on the street.
Six years in the bread factory, 18 in the mine.
Then they got fired from life
Now these aristocrats-Nui Rashuns-
are laughing at Oleg's family.
Who can stop the pain?
No Kopeck, unfiltered primo,
Bottles of Vodka,
Kniga Mormona.
They're soot babies living in another man's dream.
Their dreams deferred, drowned out, rotten in the sun.
They can't explode.
Their toilet is a bucket
and Oleg isn't laughing alongside the frozen rug.
Dyadya, give me a penny
"Dyadya, give me a penny, please."
A noise from a small figure passing on the bus.
"Here, where's your mama?"
"She's drunk."
"And papa?"
"Dead."
I'm not the butcher in this slaughterhouse.
How many pennies does God have?
Paying out of pity
To alleviate the suffering
Am I lukewarm?
Love kills the pain, but nothing
Helps the ache.
I am the butcher of this fairy tale.
I put the streaks in his skin,
The scar on his face,
The stain in his knit overalls,
Through my momentary indifference.
I think next time I won't begrudge a penny.
Two Schools
God is a myth.
Religion-"opium for the people."
Born of ignorance (and a burning flame)
We stand shackled
No where to go.
God is a living myth.
His religion-Salvation for humanity.
Born in revelation (and faith)
We walk freely
Through Narrow Gates.
Her majestic silhouette
Her majestic silhouette
Sits on a stool
Day after Day
Selling sunflower seeds to survive.
A business without profit-
All for a loaf of bread.
The New 3rd World
Foreign money
Feeds domestic corruption.
Domestic corruption
Causes suffering and pain.
Children starving, Grandma's shoveling,
Mama's crying and Papa's drinking.
Mafia-the new aristocracy
Sucks out life,
Killing the innocent
(through economic genocide),
Rewarding the crook.
Don't give'em another buck!
Thousands are dying a quiet death
Of politics, abortion & Mafia.
Lenin's children don't know their
Way out of the new box which
We call "trickle down."
Nisheta
Standing on the highway in Donetsk
Olga sells massage, beat seat covers to passersby.
She needs to feed her children-Sasha, Dima and Larisa-
And maintain her husband's vodka habit.
Politics of yesterday were
Formulated to bring equality
Now she stands-An symbol of inequality.
Dreams spoken &
Unfulfilled by unsold bead seats covers.
A mother's love transcends the
Politics of yesterday.
But cannot cure Mother Nature's
Aching over this heart attack.
Wrinkles
There goes the crazy Grandma whose
Wrinkles have seen history,
Lenin, Hitler, Stalin, Dugachyova.
Through the neighborhood she rambles-
A sight reminiscent of her story
Revolutions, concentration camps, collective farms,
and her present life
The garbage pile.
The stalwart of textbook's history
She suffered from the greed of modern history.
Now she rummages through stranger's garbage
Looking for some salo
Or an orange peel to make some tea.
She is the Garbage Grandma and everyone
Knows her name.
Approaching her pile she weeps and children snicker,
Because there stands the Garbage Grandpa,
Robbing her McDonald's.
The Impossible Life
Ukrainians live the "impossible life"
In little apartments
Designed for the working class.
There is no working class-but the slave class.
Returning Home
(1998)
It's night
and the train goes on
and we ride on it,
passing through villages
lit up by candlelight.
I contemplate home.
Where is it?
Who is it?
How do I get there?
I can smell the aroma of
perezhki and metal factories.
Soon I will understand
the aromatic tranquility
of a contented soul.
With the Ukrainian landscape
flashing past my eyelids,
I contemplate
the duality of nature-
it's nourishment to body and soul.
It's soothing to sit on the dacha,
listen to the plants grow and
smell the leaves burn.
It's swelling to eat the fresh carrots
and drink the kompot.
Kenton Call
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