The cormorant

by Stephen Komarnyckyj

should not be this far up the river,

He drifts over the backwash

Of his own shadow

A cloak preceded by its dagger,

While the river unrolls its light

In a new alphabet

And all the clocks of Leipzig tick

At the ebbing of the dark:

You dream all you cannot speak

Wildfowl plash in shadowed reeds

And on the water’s surface

Music breathes unknown octaves

And alien keys.

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Stephen Komarnyckyj's literary translations and poems have appeared in Index on Censorship, Modern Poetry in Translation and many other journals. He is the holder of three PEN awards and a highly regarded English language poet whose work has been described as articulating "what it means to be human" (Sean Street). He runs Kalyna Language Press which publishes his own poetry and translations and has taught at The Poetry School and translated a series of Ukrainian poets and their blogs for The Poetry School site under the title "Stanzas for Ukraine"