Ilya Kaminsky was born in Odessa, former USSR, and came to the US in 1993. He is the author of Dancing in Odessa (Tupelo Press, 2004) and currently teaches poetry and comparative literature at San Diego State University.
More By This Poet
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...
Author’s Prayer
If I speak for the dead, I must leave
this animal of my body,
I must write the same poem over and over,
for an empty page is the white flag of their surrender.
If I speak for them, I must walk on the...