Holder Volcano

Member of the Writers’ Union of Uzbekistan

The landscape poems

 

Holder Volcano -Abdusalomov Holder Usmanovich was born in 1959 in Uzbekistan.Graduated from Tashkent National University. He has been writing poetry and prose since 1975. He wrote 4 collections of poems, a number of novels, as well as short stories and novels in two languages, in Uzbek and in Russian. Holder Volcano has been a member of the Writers’ Union of Uzbekistan since 1999. His literary works have been translated into English. Has no titles and awards.

 

Evil neighbour

Only by moving to a new place of residence can you get rid of an evil neighbor.

(Uzbek proverb)

 

Humanity, please excuse me, of course,
but I have a suspicion that your neighbours
may have loaded their belongings onto their UFOs
and flew to other galaxies from the fact that
billions and billions of years ago,
reaching a high level of development, as today,
you attacked neighbouring planets, unleashing a bloody war,
violating their territorial integrity,
inflicting nuclear strikes on their countries,
destroying their cities, leaving you all alone …

 

17/07/2022.
In the morning 8:57.
Canada, Ontario.

 

 

The princesses of the swamps sing in the twilight

 

The moon looks aut the windows secretly,
The sleepy twinkle of the stars in the distance.
Silence is silent, so as not to accidentally,
Disturb the sleep of sleeping fields.

The country roads of the village are turning white,
Alone at the gate the wind is walking.
A star has fallen like a golden arrow of the night,
Where the princesses of the swamps sing.

 

25/03/2020. 8:59 am. Canada.

 

 

Cuckoo’s nest

 

The man waited long and patiently
looking at the grey cuckoo’s nest,
with a long pole in his hands.
He waited for and waited and finally the cuckoo,
poking it’s head out of the nest, it sang:
Kooky! Kooky! Kooky! Kook…
The man hit the cuckoo with the pole
and it fell down to the carpet.

 

01/03/2018.
10:07 in the morning.
Canada, Ontario.

 

 

Trams call for me through the snow

 

In a snowy fog, distant lights are eyes of a cat,
In delirium, whisper frozen lakes.
A lonely pedestrian is crying into a hat,
Lanterns quietly crumble the snowflakes.

The shadows of trees fallen on the snow,
Are tired and sleep until the morning.
Through the whirring snowflakes, moving slow,
The exhausted trams call for me, longing.

 

07/28/2017. Canada, Ontario.

 

 

Moon fields

 

The windows of the cat ‘s eyes shine light,
The expanses of swamps where frogs sing often.
The stars tremble on the eyelashes of the night,
Like the tears of homeless orphans.

One single cricket is ringing, feeling lonely,
Darkness over the glades, and groves of trees.
The moon rises silently and slowly,
Over the minefields.

 

09/03/2015.
4:27 p.m.
Brampton, Canada.

 

 

The Motherland calls me from afar

 

Living here, in the west is quite nice
The air is intoxicating and there are meadows .
But the soul cries like a train in the night,
To my homeland it pulls.

Poplars and willows make noise in the groves,
Like a river under the bridge Kuyganyar.
As if the Motherland calling me with it’s cries,
Repeatedly calling for me from afar.

 

24/07/2019. Canada.Ontario.

 

 

Longing for spring

 

Spring as love works wonders,
Waking nature from a sweet dream.
Soon, deafening cries heaven,
The birds return, when the grass is green .

Coming from the pathways is spring,
A slim, naive, youthful lady.
And on the poplar the bird will sing:
-Chckadi-di-di-di-di-di-di!

Hearing this for a while in silence,
People will stop digging gardens.
Will enjoy the singing birds,
Leaning against the shovel handles.

 

16/10/2015.
4:53 of day.
Canada, Ontario.

 

 

The poor trees

Rivers and ponds covered with ice,
Outside the window, the blizzard howled.
Oh trees, I would let you into the house,
And you would warm yourself by the fire,
But you’re motionless along the road,
In parks, gardens and beside the gates.
Like families in the bitter cold,
The same as people without fuel.
Shivering on the edge of a frozen river,
And you have no shelter over your head.
But trees, do you really not have a furnace,
and even a little wood?..

04/03/2015.
2:08 of the day.
the city of Brampton, Canada.

 

 

Winter dandelions

 

The late dandelions appearing beautiful
They look like fluffy, snow-white cotton.
Their hair turns grey, since they are fearful
Fearing that winter is just after autumn.

Their winds blew like dandelions in the fields,
It’s fluff whirled and flew weightless.
The trees were playing an accordion well,
Like a musician in a cluster of snowflakes.

Snow covered branches of the trees,
The snoring rivers under the ice!
Oh, how these lanterns of empty streets
look Like flying dandelions!

 

21/01/2016.
12:00 noon.
Canada. Ontario.

 

 

Bath

 

In your bath, snow-white lilies bloom
and real green reeds rustle, where frogs
sing in chorus, blowing bubbles behind their ears.
The water in it is so clear that you can even see
the sand and colourful pebbles and small fish,
which rush around in a shoal at the bottom,
not being afraid of anyone,and you,
without paying attention to them, bathe,
take a bath alone, O naked moon!

 

24/02/2021.
3: 28 pm.
Canada, Ontario.

 

 

Running

 

I saw with my own eyes how poplars and willows
ran across the plains and slopes on one leg.
There were posts, road signs, houses, roads,
stone bridges, misty meadows, horses and cows,
field camps, mulberry trees, cotton fields.
They ran after the train on which I was travelling into the distance,
having to leave my homeland.

 

15/02/2021.
1: 00 pm.
Canada, Ontario.

 

 

Fishermen

 

I was sitting on the shore alone, fishing
and suddenly I saw another fisherman,
also with a fishing rod in his hands, who
was looking at me from the depths.

 

23/01/2021.
10:00 PM.
Canada, Ontario.

 

 

Handwriting

 

I hear the rustle of falling clothes.
These are the trees quietly undressing
in the changing room of the grove,
and there, in the far-off autumn forests,
the deer with their antlers,
like hangers, roar long and mournfully.
In the sky, a farewell inscription
of flying migratory birds…
I recognize your handwriting, very much!

 

23/01/2021.
11:03 of the day.
Canada, Ontario.

 

 

Sunset

 

Evening silently breaks eggs,
On the edge of the hot sky.

 

13/12/2020.
9:24 am.
Canada, Ontario.

 

 

Longing for the desert

 

My soul is like a single grain of sand
longs for the desolate deserts,
where, like long chains of ants
word caravans go silents.

 

09/04/2020.
10:00 PM.
Canada, Ontario.

 

 

Time

 

O time, that walks with a limp on one leg
in the dial of the old clock,
tell me, do you hate each other, like people do
on our planet and often tied between you
brawl, with knifes, and axes and even
bloody hundred years of war where soldiers kills
millions of peaceful, innocent people and even children,
turning beautiful cities into ruins?
What bloody war did you fight, if it’s not a secret ,
in what field hospital of which you had one leg
amputated by military surgeons, by removing
a piece of shell from it to prevent gangrene?
O one-legged time, walking, limping on a prosthetic leg,
in the dial of the old clock!
I’m hearing the sound of your footsteps
in the midnight silence, or is it sounds of bitter tears
that drip rhythmically onto the floor
from your eyelashes?

 

17/09/2019.
4:44 of the night.
Canada, Ontario.

 

 

 

Echo

 

The water droplets fall at the midnight silence.
No, it’s not the thawing snow outside the window crying
and not the footsteps of time, which
walks, hobbling on one leg on the dial of the wall clock.
It’s the echo of your tears dripping by the window,
in the moonlight and desolate silence, there
across the oceans, in my distant homeland.

 

03/09/2018.
10:22 of the day.
Canada, Ontario.

 

 

Time clicks its tongue rhythmically

 

I’m not a king or a caretaker of dogs,
but a distant echo of the sad cries of cranes.
I’m the sombre sky and the rainfall pecking
the bunches of the Rowan trees
outside your window, which you will look
through at the distant landscape during winter,
where snow covered forests, fields and
the empty winter snow-covered roads,
the rickety huts of the village.
I’m not a king or a caretaker of dogs,
I’m just a slave to my desires.
A slave of air, water and food.
At night I look at the moon, like a fish
looking through an ice hole, in a frozen river,
listening to the sounds of the wagons of the trains
knocking against the steel spines of the Railways.
A knock that sounds like a heartbeat,
knocking of a clock sounds like hiccups
after eating the time from our lives.
I’m not a king or a caretaker of dogs,
I’m just loneliness and peace.
I am the silence and the orphan hood of old graves.
I’m a lonely passer-by, drunk in the snow blizzard
who forgot the path home.
The twilight is lit by the moon like empty white paper,
like snow-covered winter roads,
similar to our September cotton fields.
I go and lengthen my silent shadow.
Balding trees in parks, as if in a dream,
and the leaves are gently flying to the pavement.
The fallen leaves are so soft,
I want to lie on them and sleep…
Let eternity pass on it’s tiptoe,
you can sleep, locking the door.
And let time click it’s tongue rhythmically,
swinging the pendulum of the grandfather clock.

 

03/07/2019.
10:18 of the day.
Canada, Ontario.

 

 

The Motherland calls me from afar

 

Living here, in the west is quite nice
The air is intoxicating and there are meadows .
But the soul cries like a train in the night,
Pulls me to my homeland, pulls.

Poplars and willows make noise in the groves,
Like a river under the bridge Kuyganyar.
As if the Motherland calling me with it’s cries,
Repeatedly calling for me from afar.

 

24/07/2019. Canada.Ontario.

 

 

 

Religious Man

 

He believed in God, but God did not believe him.

 

14/08/2019.
8:09 in the morning.
Canada, Ontario.