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Translated By Steven Seymour

I am in love, hence free to live

by heart, to ad lib as I caress.

A soul is light when full,

heavy when vacuous.

My soul is light. She is not afraid

to dance the agony alone,

for I was born wearing your shirt,

will come from the dead with that shirt on.

Source: Poetry (January 2010).

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MORE FROM THIS ISSUE

This poem originally appeared in the January 2010 issue of Poetry magazine

• Giving Birth
  by Mary De Rachewiltz
• Asperges Me
  by Timothy Murphy
• The Grand Hotel
  by Joshua Mehigan

• January 2010 Table of Contents
• Subscribe to Poetry magazine
• About Poetry magazine
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More about this poem

Biography

Vera Pavlova was born in Moscow. She graduated from the Gnessin Academy, specializing in the history of music, and is the author of fourteen collections of poetry, four opera librettos, and lyrics to two cantatas. Her works have been translated into eighteen languages. The poems in this issue are from her first collection in English, If There Is Something to Desire, published this month by Alfred A. Knopf.

Continue reading this biography

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Poems by Vera Pavlova

• Am I lovely? Of course!
• He marked the page with a match
• Multiplying in a column M by F
• Only she who has breast-fed
• Those who are asleep in the earth

• More poems by Vera Pavlova (7 poems)
  • To converse with the greats
  • When the very last grief

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Poem Categorization

SUBJECT Relationships, Love, Romantic Love, Infatuation & Crushes

Poetic Terms Free Verse

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Related

Audio

• Poetry Lectures: Vera Pavlova & Valzhyna Mort: International Poets in Conversation

Video

• First Collection in English of Best-Selling Russian Poet

Events

• Poetry off the Shelf: Music/Words: Inna Faliks, Valzhyna Mort, and Vera Pavlova

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