homeland

I do not know when my family came to Ukraine
for how many centuries they stayed
for how much DNA lies buried in cemeteries with half-closed gates
names half-heartedly scrubbed away by time
but I do know when they left

and I do not want to center myself in a conflict
that my family fled a long time ago
but see
they still call me odessa
and so my skin still bears the history
of every ancestor that wept on those streets
they still call me odessa
so we can remember that when borders change
we will not forget
pale of settlement
black sea
this is my homeland once removed
this is my homeland removed once

I am still tied there
if yet by my name
if yet by the intense yearning
I have to call it some contour of home
some contour of homeland
and so my heart breaks in a mirror neuronal gasp
as explosions pour down
and people huddle close

I am still tied there
I am there
in a city I’ve never visited
I am there when war comes

this is not yours
I want to scream
bedraggled by the many many miles between me
and me
Odessa

I try to recall ghosts of memories from the time before the veil
scratch open consciousness and revisit the commotion of my ancestors
where would they be?
huddled in metro stations
fleeing in cars
dying on city streets
my heart splinters at the weight of the time folding
and my arms tremble in their feat of extension
could a country be held in the circumference of my arms?
could a city be held in the circumference of my name?

i have found myself writing many poems about this homeland of mine
that my great grandfather tried to scrub from his skin and from his voice
i don’t know nowhere like where the black sea meets the land
and my soul meets its rest

because I am Ukrainian by blood and by bloodshed
and I want to unwind my DNA to see it whole again
but I wait, a world apart, body trembling
and i pray in these stanzas, body bowed
when they call me odessa