Onions, Sautéed in Butter
I
Baba Yaga crone-child
bangs the table leaf
with fisted claws. She’s telling me
the same story again: the kurka
dashing round the farmyard
without its head—
my Baba, her mother shouting,
“Pish-law, kurka!”
Get out of here, chicken!
Though the whole point
was to scald the kurka
in the pot of boiling water
on the woodstove,
pluck it clean, pink
as a new pencil eraser.
“Baika balakaty”—she scolds,
“Do you know what
that means? You are
telling stories,”
Baba Yaga glares
as I scratch in my notebook
like a chicken in the dirt.
I am writing about her:
how often she complains
about my cooking.
“It’s not to my taste,” she says,
pushing away my sweet pepper pasta.
Between meals I sit on my bed
in the backroom. A closed door
still means “No Entry” to her.
We are women who have lived
for ourselves first—selfish.
My sister hasn’t forgiven her
for going back to university,
leaving her with the Polish babysitter
every winter weekday for two years.
That dumpling-woman fried perogies
every night heaped her plate
until she broke my father’s Captain’s Chair.
Back then, I was running through ravines,
climbing trees with friends,
wearing a crown of laurel leaves.
My sister doesn’t write down
the stories of her girlhood,
but her four full-grown children
return home often to reassemble
the family my sister built, fresh.
When birds fly into Baba Yaga’s picture
window—fall, warm feather
bundles—to the cracked boards
of her deck, our Baba Yaga
puts on her quilted
coat, the one with deep pockets,
fills each one with a bird.
Warm against her body, finches
sometimes flutter back to life, flush
purple as revived hearts—
II
Rescue granted her power—
we know that spell.
“Chary-naicha,
You and your sister”
Baba Yaga
calls us witches.
We are—
for taking her car away,
refusing to drive her
for ais krim because
it’s impossible to lick
a melting heap of sweet
“Moose Tracks”
while wearing a mask.
“The virus is a fairy tale.”
“Not real!” she
stomps. I challenge her
to squat-kick the Hopak
Cossack dance.
“That’s for men!”
Baba Yaga wags her bony finger
at me while gnawing
on a chicken leg. Her house
spins once, settles
on its white feathered haunches.
Back-crawling in the lake
I reach up, behind
me, stroking the sky’s blue face
I’ve memorized the rocks
under the surface
swimming beside this shore
more than half my life.
Rounding the corner I breast
stroke the last
one-hundred-and-fifty yards
my mother sits on her dock
in one of the yellow chairs,
beacons I seek
through the dark lenses
I need after so many years
staring at the sun.
Three otters surface
near the butter-coloured
lilies twenty feet
from the stony beach.
I dog paddle longing
to be like them
Otters sleek,
their fur slicked back
against round skulls
by the lake’s pomade,
black pug noses,
bristling whiskers.
They periscope,
Mother points
with her stick, grins.
I nod. They sink
without a ripple.
Mom yearns to swim.
She’d be weightless
in the water’s arms,
no need for her cane.
I offer again to help
her wade past the slippery stones
to soft sand.
Yesterday, she found
her blue and white suit
with the demure, frilly
old lady skirt.
I sit beside her
drying my hair in the sun,
glowing with the glimpse
of otters.
My mother asks in her
good girl voice:
“Onions fried in butter
with perogies tonight?”
Mother’s memories
drift in like light rain:
“I was an only child,
your Baba and Gido
worked long hours.
I had to let myself
into the flat, latch key
kid; ate kvaas on bread
for dinner alone.”
I say, “I fried onions in butter
with the perogies last night.
It’s too hot to cook.
I’ll microwave what we have.”
Mother nods. She has forgotten
the otters, our shared glimpse.
Forgotten my offer to help her swim.
I want to slide back
into the lake
like the otters
stay hidden as long as I can.
Climbing the steps
up to the house
I practice
holding my breath.