For a list of poems published elsewhere, please visit my dedicated poetry page!
It’s been a while since the last Turgenev translation, but we’re back in business! “The Threshold” was one of the first prose poems in the Senilia collection that I read and understood, so it has a special place in my heart alongside “The Skulls.” You’ll notice that this one has no commentary attached. That’s because … Read more
I resurrected the 100 Themes challenge this past year, and for the most part I’ve been sitting on the new poems instead of sharing them. They just didn’t seem “good enough” to be shared. While sifting through the collection today, however, I noticed one that I rather liked. It was based on the 28th prompt: … Read more
Now that it’s November, the Western Hemisphere is witnessing the apparent death of nature — and in the Catholic Church, we are also observing a month of prayer for the dead. So it seemed apt to choose, as my next prose poem translation, Turgenev’s “Старик” (“The Old Man”), a reflection on aging and eventual death. … Read more
Since it’s still spooky season (happy Halloween!), here’s another of the creepier prose poems in Turgenev’s Senilia collection! Meet “The End of the World,” which is as dark as it sounds — or rather darker, since “the end of the world” is a phrase that has come to be used with comic melodrama. I read … Read more
I’ll tell you what, folks. My poetic muse is on strike and has been for some time. I’ve been trying to tempt her back with treats and attention, but she’s kind of tired and mopey and depressed. I think she misses Russia. Maybe a few playful verses would cheer her up? This is a goofy … Read more