Day of the Border Guards: Poems

Kingdom of Heaven

Kingdom of Heaven Novodevichy Convent, Moscow, sixteenth century i. At thirteen, I learned to be a woman: to limn my skin with lead, like snow, to brush my brows with antimony, shape and shade of a sable’s tail. To rouge my cheeks with beets until they gleamed like poppies, pull back my hair so tight I feared I’d faint: not one single strand could show. To dilate my pupils with stinging drops so my eyes would catch the light just like a falcon’s. I was lucky: a man saw I was beautiful— saw I was strong. But he himself was weak: he died before our wedding. 42 ii. Now I pass my days embroidering faces, studding the halos of saints with pearls. Fishbone, feather stitch, chain and tuck: I work their flesh in peach-tongued silk. 43 iii. Sometimes in dreams I walk a path where gold-leaved birches rustle and nod against an autumn sky. Mushrooms cluster at the roots of trees, poppies spill their seed on the fields. I sniff—listen— my hair, my body now unbound. The path is peopled with creatures: beneath dry, dusky skin, the earth stirs, whispers the language of our feet. In this dream, my fur glows richer than the sable’s. I am flying with the falcon. I am snowing perfect pearls. 44 ...