Returning to Myrinasky

“First of all, one can’t unmask oneself too early, showing the rapacity for power, because that galvanizes competitors, making them rise to combat. They will strike and destroy the one who had moved to the fore. No, one should walk in step for years, making sure not to spring ahead, waiting attentively for the right moment. In 1930 this game brought His Majesty the crown, which he kept for forty-four years.”

The Emperor: Ryszard Kapuściński

Introduction: Returning to Myrinasky

I grew up in a grey bare palace waiting for snow to fall
Once the sharp bitter rains of summer had finished.
We were white haired children then,
Cossack children obviously,
So I rolled my wollen red hooped scarf inside out,
Wearing it tight to my eyes,
Over my ears turban like,
Ready to fight bears and tigers.
But every day there was the need to walk small,
With wary steps mindful of the silent watch of eyes,
Noting precisely every movement in silence.
Each minute of each day in Myrinasky remained unchanged ,
It was strange even the ticking sound of clocks sounded the same,
Through the quiet march of the hours of the days,
Of the weeks of the years until sleep came.
And dreams changed everything,
I dreamt I could fly,
I dreamt of getting away.
In nights silence words cascaded in the air above me,
Sometimes I shout aloud,
And have to catch myself,
Dreams that have been banished,
Take any opportunity to invade,
The quiet walls of the palace overcoming,
The darkness of the rolling breath.

Footnote: I was born and as a child lived in Myrinasky. We were told that the next village was Toomarrow. We were advised not to go there. But we were children and we would set off to walk there but we never reached it.

I dreamt of Toomarrow and forgot today.

Thus in the dream of children Empires fall. And so we fall.