SurVision Magazine / Victoria Amelina

Women

in this weird city women alone bear witness
one tells me about a vanished child
two of them about people tortured to death in the cellar
three are saying they never heard of anyone who got raped – and look away
four mention screams coming from inside the police headquarters
five mutter about people shot in their yards
six speak loudly, but I can't make out what they're saying
seven keep counting the food remaining in their storage
eight claim that I am lying and justice doesn't exist
nine only talk to each other as they make their way to the cemetery

I go there too, because I already know everyone in this city
all its dead are my dead
and all who survived are my sisters

ten of them speak about a man who survived
he too was arrested and now
can testify against the torturers

I knock on his door
a woman – his neighbour – comes out instead of him
and says:
he only seems to have survived –
you better go talk to the women

Translated from the Ukrainian by Anatoly Kudryavitsky

Victoria Amelina was from Lviv. At the age of fourteen she immigrated to Canada and was later living in the USA, but then returned to Ukraine. She worked in engineering and held a M. Sc. degree in computer science. She wrote poetry but is better known as a fiction writer. Her first novel, The Falling Leaves Syndrome, appeared in 2015; her second novel entitled Dom's Dream Kingdom (2017) was short-listed for the European Union Prize for Literature. In 2014, she was the recipient of the Ukrainian National Literary Award. Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 she has documented the crimes committed by the Russian military against Ukrainian civilians. On 27 June 2023, she was injured during the Russian terror attack on a restaurant in Kramatorsk when it was hit by an Iskander missile. She died of her injuries on July 1 at the age of 37, one of the thirteen civilians who lost their lives in this attack, including three children. Her poem, the translation of which appears on this page, was written several days before her untimely death. The Ukrainian original remains unpublished. Another one of her poems appears in Invasion: Ukrainian Poems about the War anthology ed. by Tony Kitt (SurVision Books, 2022).

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An international online magazine that publishes Surrealist poetry in English. Issue Thirteen VICTORIA AMELINA (1986-2023) Women in this weird city women alone bear witness one tells me about a vanished child two of them about people tortured to death in the cellar three are saying they never heard of anyone who got raped – and look away four mention screams coming from inside the police headquarters five mutter about people shot in their yards six speak loudly, but I can't make out what they're saying seven keep counting the food remaining in their storage eight claim that I am lying and justice doesn't exist nine only talk to each other as they make their way to the cemetery I go there too, because I already know everyone in this city all its dead are my dead and all who survived are my sisters ten of them speak about a man who survived he too was arrested and now can testify against the torturers I knock on his door a woman – his neighbour – comes out instead of him and says: he only seems to have survived – you better go talk to the women Translated from the Ukrainian by Anatoly Kudryavitsky Victoria Amelina was from Lviv. At the age of fourteen she immigrated to Canada and was later living in the USA, but then returned to Ukraine. She worked in engineering and held a M. Sc. degree in computer science. She wrote poetry but is better known as a fiction writer. Her first novel, The Falling Leaves Syndrome, appeared in 2015; her second novel entitled Dom's Dream Kingdom (2017) was short-listed for the European Union Prize for Literature. In 2014, she was the recipient of the Ukrainian National Literary Award. Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 she has documented the crimes committed by the Russian military against Ukrainian civilians. On 27 June 2023, she was injured during the Russian terror attack on a restaurant in Kramatorsk when it was hit by an Iskander missile. She died of her injuries on July 1 at the age of 37, one of the thirteen civilians who lost their lives in this attack, including three children. Her poem, the translation of which appears on this page, was written several days before her untimely death. The Ukrainian original remains unpublished. Another one of her poems appears in Invasion: Ukrainian Poems about the War anthology ed. by Tony Kitt (SurVision Books, 2022).
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