I try to pretend it isn't happening.
Posing in front of Lenin's tomb
for happy snaps, the fake smile
hides a mistake as big as Siberia.

Later, at the Stalin Dock
we sit on deck and drink Champanskoe
watching the sun set in the Volga
with no language to communicate
that isn't compromised.  The politics of love
suddenly incorrect between us.

And two more weeks in cramped quarters
watching the pine and birch repeat
mile after mile towards the Arctic Circle's
clear, perpetual daylight.
 
 

© Kathleen Jones