Associative Notes of a Refugee

Ukrainian man, Russian woman

He slipped out from under her thigh like a cluster of fish roe spilling from a gutted belly. As if there had been no other options—divorce as violence. She left for Moscow, to eat instant noodles, to inhale the grayness of limbless stray dogs, to be so grounded that the phrase existential crisis seemed like a whim of a spoiled bohemian. And he remained in his hometown, under a kind of forced house arrest—chickens chopped into tiny pieces, jellied meat in the summer, rainwater, blood sausage, and envy towards those who could still walk through the nighttime city. Yet, that city now resembled a surrealist dinner party from which, due to absurd circumstances, evacuation was impossible.

The wax from the candle reminded him of her hair—honey-colored, curly, with the scent of sweet ash. Everyone has their own initiation. His was the struggle against the invader. A delicate hand, pale like a white stem, resting on the surface of cold metal. There is no installation more absurd.

The leaves were already dry. He walked over them lightly, thinking about how he had become soft and relaxed, like marrow boiled in oil. He used to be taut and awkward, carrying a constant feeling of guilt, feeling that it was somehow inappropriate to express his thoughts, to name his secret fears for what they were. Like a stag's antler—ungainly, sharp, impossible to tuck away. But now—shoulders squared, a gelatinous consistency, falling into the abyss yet, against all laws of gravity, rising upward…