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Natalka Bilotserkivets
THE HERBARIUM
There is nothing sweeter than the scent
of a child’s hair... just a dried violet
smells this way... just a certain
blue-eyed petal on the thin stem of a neck
...and like two shoulders
two delicately glued leaves...
Best is that it’s all almost unnoticeable—
because it’s timid... here, for example, the scent...
or childhood... or even death,
though its final exhale is oversweetened anyway,
demanding...
...Yesterday God read and painted,
today He played a bit of basketball
and a clarinet.
Hundreds of routine things
have become mildly distasteful to him. Most often
he thinks about barefoot journeys,
and a fresh wind drills like a knife,
a flute tunnel in the cosmic firmament.