Wolf Child by Hadara Bar-Nadav


 
 
On September 29-30, 1941, approximately 33,771 Jews were murdered by the Nazis at Babi Yar, a ravine in Kiev. The massacre was among the largest single mass murders of Jews during WWII.
 
 
A girl rose
out of a wolf,

peeled the soft fur
down, ripped

          across her hips.

The animal consumed
from the inside.

What have I done
to survive—

          wrist bones
          still wrenched,

          electricity
          of breath

          wired
          through my teeth.

Feral, febrile,
fear-streaked.

The bloodline
severed here—.

I had been left
for dead in a forest

of emerald dreams,
scaling

the nightmare ravine—

          30 meters wide,
          150 meters long,
          15 meters deep
          and deep and deep.

The bodies: layer
upon sloppy layer

          like a botched
          jelly cake.

I ate what I needed,
my mouth flooded

          with ink—blueberries,
          blackberries, the sour

          crush of black
          currants—

and slept in a robe
of cold skin.

          You can’t catch me.
          You can’t
                    catch me.

The jaw of the earth
opening.
 
 
 
Hadara Bar-Nadav’s most recent book of poetry is The New Nudity (Saturnalia Books, 2017). Her previous books include Lullaby (with Exit Sign) (Saturnalia Books, 2013), awarded the Saturnalia Books Poetry Prize; The Frame Called Ruin (New Issues, 2012), Runner Up for the Green Rose Prize; and A Glass of Milk to Kiss Goodnight (Margie/Intuit House, 2007), awarded the Margie Book Prize. She is also the author of two chapbooks, Fountain and Furnace (Tupelo Press, 2015), awarded the Sunken Garden Poetry Prize, and Show Me Yours (Laurel Review/Green Tower Press 2010), awarded the Midwest Poets Series Prize. In addition, she is co-author with Michelle Boisseau of the best-selling textbook Writing Poems, 8th ed. (Pearson/Longman, 2011). Her awards include a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in Poetry, the Lucille Medwick Award from the Poetry Society of America, and others. She is a Professor of English and teaches in the MFA program at the University of Missouri-Kansas City.