Tell my husband Poem by Maya Sarishvili

Tell my husband
That this, my veil, grew from the skull,
Like fatty milk leaving crispy clefts.
The veil is chimney smoke.
And I am a dark chimney,
Or a hot veranda, onto which I raise up
These globules of milk fat - wasps -
In places from which there is no return, very high up . . .
Tell my husband, my mother's soul is a veil
That has flown off anxiously into my hair and sways me -
But this pain
Still lingers in my flesh, like a diamond bullet.
Tell my husband
That I shall set sugar pigeon squabs as a veil on the back of my head,
Or I shall use his letters as a covering instead of a veil,
When I grow so old and changed,
Like a flower unfurling in boiling water.

Translation: 2007, Donald Rayfield