Bohdan Ihor Antonych: 100 Years

100 years ago, on 5 October 1909, Bohdan Ihor Antonych (1909-1937), one of the greatest Ukrainian poets of the 20th century, was born.

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BOHDAN IHOR ANTONYCH

SONG ON THE INDESTRUCTIBILITY OF MATTER

Lassoed by wind, blanketed by sky,

I drag myself into the bushes and curl up

under the bracken flower like a wise fox,

where I cool and harden into white stone.

The flood of green rivers rises,

an infinity of leaves, days, and comets.

The flood will drown me. The white sun will crush me.

My body will turn into coal, my song into ash.

Millennia unroll like walls of lava.

Where we lived nameless trees will grow,

and the coal of my body will bloom like a black flower

as the picks ring out upon my heart.

--Translated by Mark Rudman