A handful of Russian land


There were bloody dawns, early.
Like a wounded by bullets in the chest ...
We drove the boys to Germany
Not given to relatives to look.
Dumped misty meadows and ravines
Under escort boys were.
But one bent over the clearing,
/ He took a handful of Russian zemli.-2p. /

After haze, fire, ruins
With it, he passed, and honest, and brave.
With this handful of earth bloody
Outputs it to the shooting.
And colored with the latest outbreak,
From the Native Threshold away,
I turned gray as curls scout
/ This handful of Russian zemli.-2p. / 1960