Sasha says:
all the chairs in here are broken
though some are more broken than others.
Outside over the garbage cans visited
every few minutes by the old and the poor
a white plastic bag drifts on the updraughts
so delicately, riding the air,
settles on the new leaves of the cotton tree
just above the steps to the door that never opens.
The only reply:
three legs good, four legs better.
I want the words for dogs, huge, loose on the streets
but the only Russian I know is da, niet, voda, pivo,
vodka, spasibo, dosvidanya: yes, no, water,
beer, vodka, thankyou and goodnight.
Horrowshow: very good. Spiceybar: thankyou.
Watch out for the dogs.
To say I love you say yellow blue vase.
All the old fear lurks on the stairs
all the way down the elevator shaft
in this Stalinist wedding-cake block of flats,
it blows on the dust of the streets,
on everyone’s shoes, in everyone’s bones.
Watch out for the dogs.