Life Continues

(Prose narrative with poetic sensibility)

When her husband passed, Praskovia stood alone. Though only fifty-three, with three children not yet grown, She chose to never marry again. When all her children, Like birds, had flown away to nest elsewhere, She remained within their small home on Lenin Street, number five. The street was later renamed to Sadovaya, and her house became nine.

Each summer, Grandmother Pasha gathered fruit from her own garden— Made dried fruit, which she cooked to sweet compote, And sent in parcels to her children and grandchildren far. Liliya remembers coming every summer to help gather Apricots and cherries, peas and poppy-seed pods, Which they would open, pour into bowls, and Grandmother Would bake into delicious rolls.

Once, arriving at the village, they found nobody home. Timofei led the children to the summer kitchen, sat to wait. Soon Aunt Klava came. She pulled the door— It would not open; Timofei held it from the other side. She tried again, confused, when suddenly the door swung wide To show Tima and his nieces.

"You're joking again," she said, inviting all inside.

Those warm remembrances of parcels filled with dried fruit, To which Grandmother added candies—"Vzlyotnyye," "Barberry" drops— Remained forever in their childhood hearts.

Grandmother had a special pot for borscht, which every Saturday She made for Sunday, saying: "If there's borscht, then none will hunger."

"At midday, Grandmother Pasha always read the Bible and would pray, And Fridays were for fasting—she would let us eat no food. We'd eagerly await Aunt Klava's return from work, Then sneak into the barn to eat the sunflower seeds Meant for the hens," Andrei Kiriluk recalled.

Grandmother Pasha loved to listen to Christian broadcasts, And evenings before sleep we prayed together always. Mother said that when they went to church meetings, Each child had to recite a poem.

Timofei, when able, visited his aging mother and his sister, And always stopped to see his brothers and his sisters living In Lugansk region. His visits came unannounced, unexpected. Julia remembers traveling to Grandmother in nineteen eighty-three When she was only seven years of age— Winter holidays, she and her sister Anna and their father flew From Kherson to Lugansk. When the final bus had left, Her father took a taxi to the village. Arriving at the house, They walked along the path toward the door. Timofei pushed it slightly open, gently urged the girls inside, Then stood outside, leaving the door just barely cracked.

The room blazed bright; the children, standing in this strange place, Were ready then to cry.

Within the room sat Grandmother and Aunt Klava, who exclaimed:

"But who are you? Are you lost?" they asked.

Julia and Anna stared in silence, understanding nothing. Aunt Klava, looking closer, suddenly knew them.

"Why, these are Timofei's younger ones!" she cried aloud.

"There he goes with jokes again!"

Then the door flew open, and their laughing father entered.

Grandmother embraced her granddaughters, took their coats and hats, While Aunt Klava hurried to the kitchen, making treats. After supper and some talk, all went to sleep, The children laid beside the warming stove. This was Julia's last time visiting her father's childhood home, And her last meeting with Grandmother Pasha.

On September tenth, nineteen eighty-seven, At eighty-five years of age, Praskovia passed away Into Christ's dwelling place for eternal life.