Ilya Kaminsky
Ilya Kaminsky Poems
And when they bombed other people's houses, we
protested
but not enough, we opposed them but not
...
Dr. Alfonso Barabinsky wants
to go outside
I hold him down with my smaller body.
He walks, runs from his shoes to my kitchen.
...
I watch loud animal bones in their faces & I can smell the earth.
Our boys want a public killing in a sunlit piazza
They drag a young policeman, a sign in his arms swaying
...
Love cities, this is what my brother taught me
as he cut soldiers' hair, then tidied tomatoes
watching Sonya and I dance on a soapy floor—
I open the window, say in a low voice, my brother.
...
To your voice, a mysterious virtue,
to the 53 bones of one foot, the four dimensions of breathing,
...
[an elegy for Osip Mandelstam]
[A modern Orpheus: sent to hell, he never returned, while his widow searched across one sixth of the earth's surface, clutching the saucepan with his songs rolled up inside,
...
In plain speech, for the sweetness
between the lines is no longer important,
what you call immigration I call suicide.
I am sending, behind the punctuation,
...
1.
Such is the story made of stubbornness and a little air,
a story sung by those who danced before the Lord in quiet.
Who whirled and leapt. Giving voice to consonants that rise
...
That was the morning strange helicopters circled.
That was the morning we damned only the earth.
We saw a soldier aim and the deaf boy Petya took iron and fire in his mouth.
His father
...
Momma Galya Armolinskaya, 63, is having more sex than you and I.
When she walks across her balcony
and the soldier "Oh" stands up
...
On the balconies, sunlight, on poplars, sunlight, on our lips.
Today no one is shooting, there is just sunlight and sunlight.
A girl cuts her hair with imaginary scissors—
The scissors in sunlight, her hair in sunlight.
...
To live is to love, a great book commands.
But such love is not enough!
The heart needs a little foolishness!
so I fold the newspaper, make a hat.
...
Little daughter
rainwater-
snow and branches protect you
white-washed walls-
...
At the funeral I, embarrassed by resistance fighters
shuffling up to shake my hand
said:
I fold your daughter in a white napkin—
...
They say so much sky in his chest addicted him
Alfonso Barabinski goes to the Opera with chickens in his pockets.
He bites a hole in an apple and in that hole
He pours a shot of vodka.
...
It is December 8 and my brother Tony was killed by the soldiers. December 8 and the police are reopening the Southern Trolleyways. December 8 when my wife lifts Tony's body from the ground,
...
Each man has a quiet that revolves
around him as he beats his head against the earth. But I am laughing
hard and furious. I pour a glass of pepper vodka
...
Ilya Kaminsky Biography
Ilya Kaminsky (born April 18, 1977 in Odessa, Soviet Union, now Ukraine) is a Ukrainian born Russian-Jewish-American poet, critic, translator and professor. He began to write poetry seriously as a teenager in Odessa, publishing a chapbook in Russian entitled The Blessed City. His first published poetry collection in English was a chapbook, Musica Humana (Chapiteau Press, 2002). His second collection in English, Dancing in Odessa (Tupelo Press, 2004), earned him a 2005 Whiting Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters Metcalf Award, the Ruth Lilly Fellowship, and the Dorset Prize, and was named the 2005 ForeWord Magazine Book of the Year in Poetry. In 2008, he was awarded a Lannan Literary Fellowship. His poems have appeared in literary journals and magazines including The Kenyon Review, New Republic, Harvard Review, Poetry. Kaminsky was born in Odessa, former Soviet Union (now Ukraine), on April 18, 1977. According to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, "Kaminsky lost most of his hearing at age 4. He lost his homeland at age 16, when family sought political asylum." At the time, he spoke no English, and continued to write in Russian while learning English. Kaminsky earned his Bachelor of Arts at Georgetown University, and went on to receive his J.D. from the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. He has been invited to teach and read poetry at literary centers, colleges and universities from Harvard to Naropa. He has also worked as a Law Clerk at the National Immigration Law Center, and more recently, at Bay Area Legal Aid, helping the poor and homeless to solve their legal difficulties. He currently teaches in the graduate creative writing program at San Diego State University, and lives in San Diego with his wife, Katie Farris.)
The Best Poem Of Ilya Kaminsky
We Lived Happily During the War
And when they bombed other people's houses, we
protested
but not enough, we opposed them but not
enough. I was
in my bed, around my bed America
was falling: invisible house by invisible house by invisible house.
I took a chair outside and watched the sun.
In the sixth month
of a disastrous reign in the house of money
in the street of money in the city of money in the country of money,
our great country of money, we (forgive us)
lived happily during the war.
Ilya Kaminsky Comments
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10/31/2025 4:29:52 PM # 1.0.0
A penetrating book, built on the most intimate fibers of the soul. Intense poems, rock-hard words, heartbreaking images... A book you can't forget soon and easily. Gratitude to the author for this creation!