And only rage can be genius. Lord, save me from kindness! The world has become an anvil now — you need nerves as strong as wires. And my nerves — oh, my nerves — my strings are stretched to the tone of this epic age! And maybe I just want happiness, dense and sweet, like chocolate. Well then, epoch, devour me, drink me dry! Just don’t unscrew the Earth from its orbit. Beneath the sky, so clear and high, lies the cold steppe of my loneliness. The Cossack wind will whip my soul, and I can barely reach tenderness. By what fire must I atone for this chronic Ukrainian kindness? And after all, a woman is just a woman — a dark, golden cello. Her body should celebrate the harvest of passion with cradles and the calm of nights. She would be such a charming chatterer, she’d find such perfect words, that — though by meaning, ears might wilt — by form alone, the heart would rest. Who has stretched such mad strings on this slender cello, that her case — one by one — became the coffins of nights made for music? And something in me commands to turn white with rage through generations! And something in me aches — and that must be, no doubt — Ukraine.
