the oracle of Russia
after the Revolution
but first the belle
she won the people's hearts
with poems, imagine!
and lovers loyal enough
to share with her
small apartments for their families
it was a strange world she lived in
Russia of the Soviets
and her descriptions of it
whiplashed the Soviets
too fragile to bear criticism
or truth
they meant to silence her
but she whispered poems in friends' ears
friends trained to memorize
and carry those poems to other ears
she survived
and her poems with her
outlived Stalin
saw her poems published again
my brother says she only wrote
what truth ripped out of her
and we still feel those claws
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