The Chechen

A new version of the poem "The Italian" by Mikhail Svetlov (1943)

On the chest of a Chechen rests a black cross
No carving, no pattern, no shiny gloss,
A modest heirloom worn by their only son,
Forever will hang on his lonely tomb…

Young man from the Chechen mountains!
What did you leave behind you in Ukraine?
So why couldn’t you stay at home to be happy
Safe and sound in your native Grozny?

I am the one who killed you near Kherson
Who dreamt of the distant Caucasus so often
How I yearned on the Dnipro to be free,
Just once to take a trip to Chechnya and Grozny!

But I didn’t come there to you with a gun,
To take away your life and summer sun.
My bullets were not fired to whistle by
In your own sacred, peaceful Shali sky.      

I shot and killed you here where I was born,
Where I was proud to fight like those before,
Who died for us that we might share their pride
Defending lives whose tales have been denied.      

The winding, twisting river Dnipro flows
In ways a Russian scientist never knows.
This is our land and always will so remain
Did you ever plough or sow here in Ukraine?

No! You came in trucks and tanks to seize
And kill, destroying these distant colonies,
So the family’s modest cross and heirloom
Will grow to the size of a soldier’s tomb…

I warn you now, so it is not mistaken
I will not let my dear homeland be taken!
Each shot I take is with Ukrainian pride,
Each bullet comes with justice on its side!

You never lived here, never came in peace!
But scattered in our blackened snowy fields,
Glazed in the frozen gaze of those dead eyes,
Still now reflect the Chechen hills and skies…

Samuel Novnik © 2022