Trafika Europe 7 - Ukrainian Prayer

Maria Matios

even a sign, as if thewater had carried people off without a trace; except someone was gossiping about Kuryk that he was somewhere in prison on the other side … But whether they were telling the truth, or lying, who knows? People like that – know how to lie better than to tell the truth. Mykhailo doesn’t understand this, because it doesn’t concern household matters. He’s just interested inhiswork and his household, but, God forgive, in the village Kuryk was so much the ringleader, that a little bit more – and he would have earned himself some prison time here. There are those kinds of people who bring trouble on their own heads. But that’s their problem. Though, a whole bunch of Kuryk’s children were left behind… And how could one run away from

his own flesh and blood, and dump everything on the teeny tiniest woman like Mrs. Kuryk? And yet, something attracted the man there to Galicia, something stronger than his children and wife… Something attracted him. There Mykhailo’s workbench and ax attracted him in a way that neither the tavern, nor carousing attracted him. Maybe someone wonders about him the way Mykhailo wondered about Kuryk and about those who disappeared with Kuryk to the other side. …Mykhailo looks from the dam to the other side and feels, that maybe for the first time in his life his heart was aching. And he senses a vague anxiety, as if right now that hawk that’s hanging lifelessly over the nape of his neck as though over carrion is about to steal him, as though it’s

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