Viy

The steppe has swallowed every path The stars have turned away Three scholars on a road that ends Wherever shadows say No cross, no light, no dog to bark The grass as tall as men The night out here is older Than any book or pen Knock, and the dark will answer Ask, and the dark provides A roof, a bed, a hostess And everything she hides An old crone at the gateway Her eyes two flooded wells She counts the three like cattle And separates the stalls Knock, and the dark will answer Ask, and the dark provides A roof, a bed, a hostess And everything she rides

Her hands are on my shoulders Her knees are at my spine The earth lets go its holding The stars are running wine Ride, my scholar, ride Ved'ma! Ved'ma! The night is her bridle and whip Ved'ma! Ved'ma! The world silvering under the trip Below — a meadow made of glass A pale girl in the stream So beautiful, so hollow God, wake me from the dream I speak the words against her The holy syllables Each prayer a stone she stumbles on Each name of God a wall Ved'ma! Ved'ma! The bridle is breaking at last Ved'ma! Ved'ma! The rider is under the horse

I found a fallen fence-post I swung with all my dread Blow after blow to break the spell That rode me nearly dead She dropped into the grasses The crone-voice thinned and tore And something else was lying Where the witch had been before A girl as young as morning Lashes wet with light Blood at the mouth that cursed me Beauty broken white She fell as a maiden Who rose as a crone Whatever I have murdered It will not stay alone

A rider from a rich man's yard A name inside his mouth My name — that no one there should know Sent for, and carted south Pray three nights, scholar Pray three nights alone They say the daughter faded Came home across the field Beaten by some passing thing That would not be revealed Summoned by the dying Requested by the dead She spoke my name with her last breath And nothing else she said The old chief will not weep for gold He'll pay in gold for prayer And if I run — his Cossacks ride And find me anywhere Summoned by the dying Requested by the dead Whatever waits inside that church Already knows my tread

They dressed her in the morning They laid her in the nave A face that God would envy On its way into the grave No rot has touched the temple No grey has climbed the skin Beauty like an open blade Inviting hands in Too lovely for the coffin Too quiet for the death I know this face — it rode me It cursed me with its breath She is waiting to be watched Too lovely for the coffin Too patient for the death The candles bend away from her The church holds its breath

Svyat, svyat, svyat A ring of chalk, a rail of prayer A border drawn in dust The word of God around my feet The only wall I trust The coffin lid is moving The dead girl sits upright Her eyes are open, seeing nothing Feeding on the night She walks — svyat, svyat, svyat She gropes along the pews Her fingers read the empty air An inch from where I stood Do not look at her face Do not answer her call Nothing exists but the circle The circle, the words, that's all She walks — svyat, svyat, svyat The dark bends at the line She cannot cross, she cannot see Till dawn the ground is mine

The second dusk, the second lock The candles thin as thread Tonight she does not fumble Tonight she flies instead The coffin leaves the floor It carves the air in rings Around, around the chalk it goes On black unbodied wings Wings at every window Claws at every beam Words — I hold the words The words hold back the scream Circle hold — circle hold — The night is in the nave Every pass she's lower Every prayer I cave The coffin rides the darkness The dead girl steers the storm Till cockcrow cuts the string of it And dawn comes pale and warm They brought me bread at morning And no one met my stare The mirror in the well showed The winter in my hair

The glass gives in like water The night pours through the frames A congregation with no faces Filling up the nave Legion at the chalk line Legion at the word A thousand mouths that cannot cross One prayer still being heard They claw the border, shrieking They break like waves on stone The circle is a burning coast They cannot make their own Enough — the dead girl rises Her voice a splitting bell "He stands behind a line of God — Then bring the eyes of hell" Legion at the chalk line Legion, part and kneel Something older takes the road On footsteps made of steel

Iron where a face should be Roots instead of feet And lids that drag along the stones A blindness grown concrete Podnimite mne veki — ne vizhu Don't look — the old blood tells me Don't look — the circle knows The lids go up like coffin lids And every candle slows "There he is!" — the iron finger "There he is!" — the wall of wings The circle dies like breath on glass The scholar dies of what he's seen

The second cockcrow caught them Half-out of every frame Stone-stuck in the windows Wearing the dawn like shame No priest would cross that threshold No road remembers how The thorn has taken gate and dome The church is forest now And the ones who knew him, drinking, Said all there was to say: He would have stood till morning — But fear got in the way Sealed with its congregation Green over iron and bone Whatever won that third night Sits on a hidden throne