five poems
by Mykyta Ryzhykh
Bird
bird with two wings
cannot dig a pit
for its chick
Why
Why should I remember you?
Why should I come to you?
Why should I remember you?
Why should I die of love
For you? Why mold your name
From melted snowflakes?
I'm not even sure I know anything true about you
And I'm dying in this illusion or love
Where have I been?
Where have I been? I was looking for words that had not yet been invented. The bustling city did nothing to improve my vocabulary. After your death, all the old letters and sounds still lost their meaning, and nothing new followed. The sounds of the city are a collection of random letters and occasionally incoherent words. I killed you as gently as possible and forgot the words. My voice can't do anything. When you died, my vocal cords died along with you. When you were dying of love for me, I was deaf. Today I am speechless. You died inside my head. I hope your happiness is hidden in laughter and a happy voice somewhere hundreds of kilometers away from my silence.
*Originally published like PDF: Buttonhook Press 2024 Broadside Series
https://ojalart.com/buttonhook-press-2024-broadside-seriespoetry-all-forms-stylesmykyta-ryzhykhwhere-have-i-been/
Winter
Three priests don't know
How to pray with their
Fingers stuck together.
Prisoners in a camp are
Making the forest out of
Each other's corpses.
Сount of days
ponies stuck in pink peonies
a red sun rose in the depths of a hollow
there we swam in this silence of the heart that someone called a hollow
we did not swim: we were the silence of the heart
from the crack of a broken palm meadows fall out
forests cities and dead animals without graves
only lonely stars remind us that the world is huge
we count the sharp angles of the night lights at the rootstock of the blackthorn
*Originally published in MasticadoresUsa.
BIO: Mykyta Ryzhykh, an author from Ukraine, now lives in Tromsø, Norway. He was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2023 and 2024. He’s published in many literary magazines іn Ukrainian and English: Tipton Poetry Journal, Stone Poetry Journal, Neologism Poetry Journal, Shot Glass Journal, QLRS, The Crank, Chronogram, The Antonym, Monterey Poetry Review, Five Fleas Itchy Poetry and many others.