Seven Movements by the Sea Yevpatoria Suite

Part One: Sol Minor (Imperial Village)

Down the alley where century lindens sway,
Their crowns whispering Pushkin's ancient lay,
Her heels sink deep in gravel's yielding bed,
While lace collar chafes her tender head.

Mother insisted on "proper dress"—
But fifteen knows propriety's distress.
A gilded cage of manners and of form,
While schoolgirls' laughter rides the morning storm.

Beyond the park their voices ring like bells,
As she plucks lilac petals, memory tells
Of father walking Nevsky's broad parade
With his new wife—the choice that love betrayed.

"Daddy's girl"—once a cherished name,
Now cuts her throat like ribbon edged with shame.
Her pocket holds verses on envelope's torn edge:
"I learned to live simply, wisely"—wisdom's pledge.

God must dwell in gray clouds gathering high
Above Catherine's palace, gilt turned shy,
Where golden domes fade to pewter's gleam
Beneath the storm-clouds' silver-shadowed dream.

Part Two: Piano's Rupture (Yevpatoria, 1905)

The sea that day breathed fury from its core,
Storm-lifted waves crashed wild upon the shore,
Erasing tracks her bare feet left behind.
She shed her dress—conventions left confined.

An old boat lay upturned like turtle dead,
Salt spray stung skin, seaweed wrapped thread by thread
Around her ankles, trying to hold her fast.
Two hours in open water—die was cast.

Her pale, lithe body cut waves like a blade,
Swimming back, skyward gaze, no fear displayed.
The gulls above wrote Arabic in air,
While she emerged with water in her hair.

No towel needed—rivulets ran free
Down ribs to sand in patterns by the sea.
Three market boys stood gawking by the boat,
Reeking of fish and tar—they'd take note.

The eldest, Kolka, boatswain's son, whistled clear:
"Damned mermaid!" rang harsh in her ear.
She pulled wet dress over naked skin—
Fabric clung close, outlining within.

Laughter behind her—she would not turn round.
A familiar voice made mocking sound:
"Hey, miss, your hair's like jellyfish today!"
She pinned it up with shell—then walked away.

Part Three: Cello Solo (Night After Swimming)

Mother waited, drooping on the porch,
Like wet sheet hanging in sorrow's torch.
A letter from him—still sealed, unread.
"Anna, you've been..." her voice filled with dread.
"Swimming."
"Sinning?"
"The sea knows no shame."
Door slammed—in her room, all was same:
Medicine scent and incense burning low,
Father's photo from long ago.

She tore it half—then mended it again,
Too clear the memory of his warmth remained.
Moonlight crept through window's silver frame,
She wrote: "If you knew from what refuse came..."
Refuse became all: fishermen's crude jest,
Salt lips after swimming, Kolka's eyes that pressed
Fire into her back—all turned to verse,
Poetry born from blessing and from curse.

Part Four: Contrabass Tremor (Nikolai)

He came in white suit and panama hat,
Like Maupassant's hero where shores are at.
Saw her emerging from the ocean's foam—
Froze still, dropped Verlaine's treasured tome.
"Have you read Baudelaire's 'Sea Night'?" he asked,
Retrieving his book, in cologne basked.
"In the original French." His fingers shook—
Later he'd write in his private book:

"She rose from depths like Venus from the sea,
But instead of shell—wet calico clung free
To her hips, her eyes like Arctic ice.
I knew at once—muse or my sacrifice."

He spoke of Paris, read Verlaine aloud,
While she thought of Kolka, rough and proud.
When Nikolai tried to kiss her dress's hem,
She laughed: "You fear the real sea, don't you then?"
His lips smelled of brandy and of lies—
Truth lived elsewhere, beneath the skies.

Part Five: Percussion (The Storm)

That day began with thunder's mighty roar,
She swam out further than e'er before,
Until the shore became a pale thin line.
Cramp seized her calf—she turned supine.
The gulls sang songs of ancient sea-worn lore,
She remembered father teaching swimming's shore:
"Float like an aristocrat!" he'd say—
Noble bearing even in the spray.

A wave crashed over—salt burned her eyes,
She surfaced gasping beneath gray skies.
From shore came cries: "She'll drown!" they called,
But deeper dove she, pride enthralled.
The rocks near lighthouse caught her weary form,
Dress torn by shells in ocean's storm.
She walked home dripping water, bleeding pride,
While mother mended tears, tears she couldn't hide.

Part Six: Harp of Memory (Echo of Betrayal)

At midnight crept she to the fishers' place,
Kolka slept in boat, sail hid his face.
Upon his chest she placed a heart-shaped shell—
Payment for silence, secret to keep well.
He hadn't told her mother of her flight
When she prowled beach with strap, face white.

"Why?" he woke, gripped her wrist so tight.
"So you'll remember."
His fingers smelled of mussel, ocean's brine,
She pulled away before his lips met mine.

Next morning Nikolai brought poppies red,
Spoke of marriage, future wed.
She tore the petals, cast them to the sea:
Loves—betrays—flees—dies—destiny.
The ocean sent the flowers floating back,
As if to fill what her heart did lack.

Part Seven: Finale (Birth of the Poet)

Years later, signing "Evening," her first book,
She'd taste Yevpatoria's salt, backward look.
Nikolai, now husband, raged and broke
A vase—while she, inspired, wrote and spoke:

"I need no more these legs of mine,
Let them become a tail divine!
I swim, and joy runs cool and deep,
Far from these heights so hard to keep..."

Kolka would die in Civil War's cruel game,
Mother would pass, unforgiveness her name.
Father would write repentance—she'd burn it whole,
Never reading words that might console.

But that night, sixteen, upon the cliff,
She heard the echo, stern and stiff,
Ocean returning what she'd given free—
And understood: pain makes melody.
The notes were there, the music in her soul,
All that remained—find words to make it whole.