Granite [Excerpt] by Anna Prismanova

One might suppose that I shall not forget you,

but that won't be because I loved you so,

rather because you chanced to be the fire

which I myself employed to hew my soul.



by Анна Семёновна Присманова (Anna Semyonovna Prismanova)
a.k.a. Анна Симоновна Присман (Anna Simonovna Prisman)
(late 1930s or early 1940s?)
translated by Robert Chandler

Interesting info: She is considered comparable to her contemporary, the American poet, Louise Bogan and challenged traditional ideas of femininity in her poetry as seen in this closing stanza of the poem Granite

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