Susan Hwang

I really have been doing things. Documenting things––not so much, but doing things, sure. Kinda non-stop. Making things. Sharing things. Making times––with and without accordions.

This is footage from a recent performance at Theater For The New City, representing Yara Arts Group.

I sang two songs with lyrics from poems by Serhiy Zhadan––Ukraine’s most celebrated contemporary poet.

Marlon Cherry on percussion and backing vocals. Ed Pastorini on piano.

These are the poems:

AVIATION 58 by Serhiy Zhadan

Stand a long time at the edge of a snowy field,
Hesitating to taking the first step
into the endless expanse of snow, the endless expanse of language,
observing the bird’s wing of winter,
Maybe this time you’ll manage to cross to the silence,
Maybe this time you’ll manage to find the balance between
light and dark.
Maybe this time everything will work out and the syllables will open
the heart of the smallest reader,
like a river in winter.
While taking up the hard task of reading,
I know how hard it is to convince yourself
that it will really help.
I know how hard it is to admit
that what’s really important
are the simple things –
breath held because
of an unexpected connection of words,
light which comes down from above
because of a well selected melody –
simple things that distract us from
grave illness and family tragedy.
So, let’s try it again.
From the top.
From that place where there is nothing,
but anything can exist.
Books cannot save us,
But at least we won’t be afraid of what we’ve read.
Poets cannot teach us bravery,
But a meeting them should not cause fear.
Let’s try it again.
Let’s not be afraid.
Hold books in hand,
like birds we gathered after the snow –
not all will fly
not all will return.
Still you should not let them drop.
They should all be warmed.
They should all be equal in the face of death.

Translated from the Ukrainian
by Virlana Tkacz and Wanda Phipps

LIGHT by Serhiy Zhadan

Light.
A great light rises
on all marked by darkness, on all,
so gripped by fear, they can’t
enter the dark home,
where in the emptiness you feel the presence of a stranger
and voices gone are the ones you hear.

A year of ant-like determination.
A year of calling out names
that will never answer you.

We heard inside the unsettling echo of the sound,
Like the flight of a bird though the air,
like the invisible work of plants 
that give life to a wasteland.
Because the light rises on the tame and rises on the wild,
on those broken by screams, on those mad with sorrow,
and language, like a lung, burned by pain
comes to life, resounds and does its work
filling us with 
sound like wine.

This is why we love you.
Great god of signs and letters,
generous ruler of personal names,
whose presence we notice
between silence and too much talk.
You’re in the unseen syllables of sound, where, like grass,
the important things grow:
The name of the land,
The name of the river,
The name of your beloved.

Translated from Ukrainian by Virlana Tkacz and Wanda Phipps