If I were born in Prague
I’d avoid baroque concerts in libraries, libraries with plaster rosettes, libraries with flowers, libraries, with bland
«Virgin and child». I would avoid it all.
I’d avoid talkative American women, the Little wax Jesus, Jesus who coughs in my childhood, in my father’s
vocabulary: «soft as the velvet pants...»
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If I were born in Prague
I’d grow up as a prémontré monk and would drink at the bottom of the hill. I’d sit on ochre and green roofs, by the
cream walls. I’d sit on church roofs, by the blackened iron turrets capped with a golden ball or a pistachio green
ridge. I would spit in the circular windows.
I’d become the first monk to frequent the Strahov book of gospels; I’d give to pigeons all my moments,
anonymously, as a calligrapher, binding in leather useless and beloved texts.
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If I were born in Prague
I’d pretend to I am a streetcar driver, riding around the city of puppets locked up in closets.
I’d become a Jew and sing the Kaddish to the walls. Hello, walls. I’d whistle a lullaby to the children born in
Prague and drink all morning, like a poet.
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If I were born in Florence
I’d paint on the city walls the massacre of the holy innocents — their slaughtered bodies at their mothers’ feet in Iraq.
I’d open up the portraits of the Virgin’s silent hands without a face.
I’d abandon the city and its Vespas for country life where the breeze steals the smell of fresh pasta and olive oil from
trattorias.
I’d pay a woman to paint a girl forgotten by God; I’d love her to the sound of the bells for Angelus.
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If I were born in Chartres
I’d be a cathedral of stained glass. I would offer my stolen light to the sun.
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If I were born in Chartres
I could not live in the present.
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If I were born in Nice
I’d open a French-fries-and-cheese stand of fries and reblochon, house-fries: each day firmer, crisp like tempura,
cheese pampered, melting.
I’d open my hands to the ravishment of minutes– I’d stand, naked, hands open to the sun, in Nice.
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If I were born in Nice
I’d become a bather, breasts in the sun pretending indifference to stares of those who pretend to be looking at the sea.
I’d drink with women a wine from the nearby hills, a mute pleasure.
And after that, I’d die.
Katie Farris is the author of boysgirls, as well as a co-translator of books of poetry from the French and Russian. Her translations and original work have been published in literary journals including Virginia Quarterly Review, Triquarterly, Hayden’s Ferry. She received her MFA in Literary Arts from Brown University. She currently teaches at San Diego State University.
For more on Ilya Kaminsky, look here.