Autumn

Watercolors spread in blotches,
drying into different shades:
brown at the bottom,
yellow and red at the top.
Green still glimmers among the branches,
hoping, in humble resignation,
for the last bits of the autumnal sun.
No motions, no words.
Everything is still. Forever!
And only in the sky, like a fat herd of cows,
clouds drift to calving.
Soon, soon wind, the herald of nature,
will start its stormy howl,
promising the near delivery
of icy, freezing-cold water.

By Kristina Kryukova

Translated by Sergey Gerasimov from Russian.

Kristina Kryukova is an author from Russia. She lives in Moscow. Her most recent poems have appeared Salmon Creek Journal, Poets Choice. She graduated from the Moscow University of Culture and Arts. Winner of several national and international poetry awards, mother of two kids