Some Poetic Gems from Ukrainian Poet Halyna Kruk
When the Political Becomes Poetic
[Halyna Kruk]
On February 24th, 2022, four years ago, Russia invaded Ukraine. Although this isn’t an anniversary one can “celebrate,” we can still honor the resilience of the Ukrainian people and their rich culture. As American writers, artists, and musicians daily meet up at Starbucks sipping over-priced unpronounceable libations and narcissistically complaining about cuts to state and federal art fellowships (I’m capable of this, too), it’s important to remember that at the Paris Olympics, according to Reuters, at least 488 Ukrainian athletes and trainers had been killed since early 2022, and it’s estimated that, over the last four years, hundreds of artists from all genres have perished. I’m sure that these estimates are lower than suggested, just as I’m sure more and more brilliant minds, minds that can significantly changed the world, will perish as time goes on.
So what can we do to offset the current administration’s shameful treatment of Ukraine and their president. Go online. Contribute to Ukrainian help funds. Buy merchandise whose profits go to help everyday Ukrainians.
But, for today, let’s just read and be moved by the poetry of one of Ukrainian’s best contemporary poets, Halyna Kruk. Below is an introduction and sampling of her work.
[This introduction was co-written by Halyna’s translators Dzvinia Orlowsky and Ali Kinsella. Find Halyna’s new book, Lost in Living, at Lost in Living Her first book, A Crash Course in Molotov Cocktails, was published by Arrowsmith Press in 2023, translated by in Amelia Glaser and Yulia Ilchuk's, which was a finalist for the Griffin Prize in 2024. You can find it on Amazon at A Crash Course]
Halyna Kruk is one of Ukraine’s most compelling contemporary poets—an artist driven, as Czesław Miłosz once defined poetry itself, by a “passionate pursuit of the real.” Her poems don’t hover at a safe distance from experience; they move straight toward it, with a clarity and urgency that feels almost physical. A 2024 Griffin Poetry Prize finalist, Kruk is the award-winning author of five books of poetry as well as works of prose. She lives and works in Lviv, Ukraine.
A central voice in Ukraine’s post-Soviet literary renaissance, Kruk came of age in the vibrant, experimental literary culture of 1990s Lviv, where irreverence, formal daring, and ethical seriousness were inseparable. From her earliest books to her most recent work, she has used imagery and tonal shifts to draw readers into moments where the stakes are unmistakably human.
Lost in Living (Lost Horse Press, 2024) Lost in Living, Kruk’s first full-length collection in English—from which “we carry our dead,” “vyshyvanka,” and “heavy water” are excerpted here with permission—gathers poems written before and during Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. This is not a book about war so much as a book written in its long shadow, where death is ever-present, hope is provisional, and meaning must be made from the smallest acts of attention and care. Kruk has said that poetry cannot stop bullets, that “no metaphors work against an armed soldier.” And yet, in poems that refuse consolation without surrendering to despair, she insists on what poetry can still do: sharpen awareness, honor vulnerability, and affirm survival itself as a form of action. Included here as well is an untitled poem (“what are you afraid of, heart”), whose translation is unpublished in the United States.
we carry our dead we carry our dead like children lay them out in the plaza and encircle them in the frost the snow bewildered as if none of us yet knew it was so easy to die everyone still hopes they will lie there and then get up for what should we tell their moms what to tell their children who will tell them the worst a person runs to meet a bullet with a wooden shield and a hot heart and a head in a ski helmet full of blood mom, I’ve got my hat on he shouts into a dead phone mom, his hat is too thin the bullet hisses vyshyvanka day “we recognized our men by their embroidery,” the old woman next door told me about those executed in forty-six “there was nothing else left to recognize them by—a continuous wound. each remembered her embroidery” may we never have to identify our own only by their embroidery I thought then even if there are so many of us I think now heavy water and when you don’t care to whom all these poems are dedicated and when you no longer believe you can stop blood with words and turn heavy water into wine and all that you have enough inner light for is to see that there no more calls, texts, wonder what are you now supposed to do with the rest of your life? (vending machines here rarely give change, especially when the bill is crinkled, like your face after driving all night) it’s five, daybreak is soon and the semis at the gas station sleep standing up like elephants and you get hung up on the thought that you’ve never seen how elephant calves sleep and this all would be so tragic if it weren’t so widespread in the all-powerful voice of the lord the cashier says, “your macchiato” and returns you to life from your desert where you’ve been searching all these forty years for an exit and here it is: go and your decisiveness scares the random morning shooting victims and you calmly tell them, “don’t be afraid, I’m peaceful” and after a pause you add, “peaceful as an atom” This is a new poem from Halyna *** what are you afraid of, heart,—her subconscious asks— that you won’t be able to return home? there’s nothing left—only ruins and emptiness consider this an endless vacation when else would you be able to live with a sea view, learn mindfulness, do yoga, isn’t this what you wanted? not this, she says when the wind drives a flock of clouds at dusk every good householder comes out to meet it relaxed elderly people, their shoulders straightened their faces lit up, and children safe everywhere like an abundant scattering of pearls, so generously ripened olive eyes, broad gestures, swift chatter, what are you afraid of heart? that you’ll get used to safety? that you’ll fall for luxury? that you won’t hurt anymore for the land where there’s nothing but ashes and ruin, so much of it that even in dreams you fear stepping there what do you beat for, heart?—her unconscious wonders, this woman returning to Ukraine from paradise April 2025 [co-translated by Ali Kinsella and Dzvinia Orlowsky]
You can find Peter Johnson’s books, along with interviews with him, appearances, and other information at peterjohnsonauthor.com
His most recent book of prose poems is While the Undertaker Sleeps: Collected and New Prose Poems in paperback ($24) and hardcover ($30). In the Kindle Store, it’s free on Kindle Limited, or, surprisingly, only $5 if you don’t have Kindle Limited KindleUndertaker (Publisher, MadHat Press).
His most recent book of fiction is Shot: A Novel in Stories
Find out why he is giving away his new book of prose poem/fragments, even though he has a publisher for it, by downloading the PDF from the below link or going to OLD MAN’S homepage. His “Note to the Reader” and “Introduction” at the beginning of the PDF explains it all: Observations from the Edge of the Abyss