Tatjana Lukic
East Row, Mort St
it started just at the time of morning tea
‘no sugar for me’, one of the fleshy gods said
and emptied his spoon over concrete land
‘it’s snowing!’ at one dash
we all left our desks
and rushed to the windows
‘open, sesame, open!’
just to catch a flake
and we will behave well again
staring at the screens till dark
‘open now, it’s snowing!’
but there is no magic fit enough
to move the glass walls of our cell
one by one
we walked quietly back
to our chairs
and dialled
a dear one
‘it’s snowing, darling, open the window!’
recorded all answering machines
across the lake
‘no sugar for me’, one of the fleshy gods said
and emptied his spoon over concrete land
‘it’s snowing!’ at one dash
we all left our desks
and rushed to the windows
‘open, sesame, open!’
just to catch a flake
and we will behave well again
staring at the screens till dark
‘open now, it’s snowing!’
but there is no magic fit enough
to move the glass walls of our cell
one by one
we walked quietly back
to our chairs
and dialled
a dear one
‘it’s snowing, darling, open the window!’
recorded all answering machines
across the lake
Tatjana Lukic published four verse collections in former Yugoslavia in the 1980s and migrated to Australia in 1992 where she lives in Canberra and works as a sociologist. Her translations are published widely in Australia, the USA and Eastern Europe. This poem is from her new collection, the first written in English.
Page(s) 31
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