My Russia
Sometimes it is so cold here that I wrap scarves around my neck to go to sleep and listen as the wind plays between the windowpanes, catching on the cracks and whistling as it scratches its nails against the buildings made of brick, discoloring and crumbling. The depth of the cold penetrates the layers and freezes between every one. Sometimes early morning they melt away and some days they stay, even at times for months on end, and the crystals as they evaporate twinkle in the early morning light, stealing away with them the dreams that made me toss with fright and turn in joy. The haughty peacy shiny curtains do their best to kep the ice inside this room - let it in, don’t take it out. Vague swirls frozen in those folds, forced to stand still, in their rage and jealousy block all other dances, hear no longer the other songs. Mornings and sometimes even nights I sit off the side of my bed, stare into the drapes and lose all expression, lose all the emotion. Blank, dull, worn out eyes reflect the ugly colors and the ice doesn’t melt, but settles deeper in the layers, the folds and pleats of my dress, into the waves and curls of my hair. Patterns rise to the ceiling and the bed is the warmest place I’ve ever known and sleep will bring me peace, will take away the cold and ugly colors, roses light my lips. Eyes forget the difference. There is no light and dark down in the streets of Moscow.
There on the Metro, is a mass of faces, and they are all the same. Tell me about life, your life. Where are you always going? Shuffling by blinking out the sun, because stars and moon no longer exist here. The rain here dribbles on and on, no thundrous storm, no lightning lit skys. Complacent, grey, pathetic rain, and they all have long ceased to hold the imagination, standing as they do. The world tilts a little further and I feel as If i’m falling off, or sometimes sinking in. The absence of any green, any tree not sticking out of the pavement wall meters away, taller than the next, and next, and next. Only the bells still hold power over the mazes, but the bells have become so surreal, never saying where they are going, always telling truths. The cold compresses down and everywhere I advert my eyes - the Pale, the Dark, the Lost. Where are they going? Places brighter than my one I hope. Do their feet lead them where their hearts no longer dwell, day after day after day? Do their feet and toes cramp up and the heaviness - do they see it running through their heads. Your life I’m forgetting, it’s going, can’t you see. The Brown Line runs in circles and every morning you are the same.
In the corner stood boxes and I had to stand against the wall groping for the crack as the train lurched in the opposite direction.It was rush hour and I was in the last car. It always seems to be the worst ventillated, but none of them are ventillated. On the floor, hunched up like a ball, squated a blond-headed boy. People stepped around him. Oblivious? A couple maneuvered between the drunk boy and myself. They forgot that the Metro car was a Metro car, and pressing close to each other they breathed a bit of life into the car. But soon, realizing that between myself, the drunken boy, and the babushka with her cart, there wasn’t much room, they left the car. The man by the door stared directly at me, and the air was stale from the old smoke that always lingers, that particularly Russian smoke, that even foreign cigarettes have. People read their papers, others stared intensly at the posters. Each and every one denied the existance of the other, senses knew the presence, but minds and hearts strove to create the distances. Only the man at the door continued to stare. I laughed, blushed, and turned my head. Some noticed the crazy girl with a glance that said "foreigner"! Others continued to stare at the same posters they stared at at least twice a day, everyday. I didn’t stop laughing, and bursting from that car a stop later, I was glad to be free and happy to laugh. Some days the Metro isn’t as serious as people believe it to be.
The trees lining the boulevard admidst that city background have grown yellow and the air is crisp even in the city where the sky is gray day and night. And there walks alone a bearded figure with a leather cap, and jacket which once were black and now are only grey like his eyes and his hair and the sky. Only the trees sweeping the boulevard are yellow; the air forms clouds from his mouth. He pauses, lifting a cigarette to his mouth and continues down the boulevard, where there comes another man, a bearded greying individual whose leather cap and jacket once were black, but now are grey like his eyes. They shake hands tightly and closely as long forgotten friends, comrades, soldiers, in an ungoing war never to be won. There is no smile shared. But the grey eyes reflect the yellow leaves and ignite in a stoic recognition that goes beyond the common paths in a common day, to a day when only pain was common and when the sky was not quite as grey as it is now. The stranger lights the cigarette of his brother and each continues on down the boulevard where the autumn yellow is fading into Moscow's winter grey.