Natalka Bilotserkivets’s work, known for lyricism and the quiet power of despair,
became hallmarks of Ukraine’s literary life of the 1980s. The collections Allergy (Алергія) (1999) and Central Hotel (Готель Централь) (2004) were
the winners of Book of the Year contests in 2000 and 2004 respectively. In the West, she’s mostly known on the strength of a handful of widely translated poems, while the better part of her oeuvre remains unknown. She lives and works in Kyiv.
No love is happiness, especially like this:a face clamped in a handful, lifted upto an impatient, grinning mouth.Maybe you, too, want to avoid the tip of a knife—only the meek, sacrificial, avian soulcan give steel molecules a taste of sweet blood. Every love is unhappiness, especially mine:it stands near the bed like a small half-wit,looking tenderly, asking for harmless comfort.Yet… Read more →
Stumbling Among Stars Of a despairing world How sweetly and quickly your heart beat.That, I remember. But snowwas already coming from the Dniprosticking to our eyes and glasses,wrapping parks and boulevards with the smell of rumpled wet fur. Let’s walk together, you and I. It’s snowing in Kyiv and Lviv.It’s raining in Lima and Paris.So much that at this late hour we can… Read more →