Clothes come to the party,
they wear you underneath
and I’m afraid.
Roasted nuts
speed along in a thousand directions,
and from those deep plates, become invisible.
Numerous tongues. Brightly colored lips.
The many rhythms of nodding chins.
The quickly shrinking past—
soon I will enfold it in a candy wrapper.
Your day’s reflection over the new entertainment—
cutting off every frame from the film
except those of pendulous women offering their consent.
What are the recently depressed accused of?
How do you lift up the women
to whom you’ve taught everything?

Maya Sarishvili is one of the most prominent women poets writing in the Republic of Georgia today. In 2008, she won the SABA Prize for Poetry, Georgia’s top poetry prize. She is the author of two collections of poetry—Microscope (2008) and Covering Reality (2001)—as well as three radio plays. She lives in Tbilisi, where she works as a third grade teacher and is the mother of four children.

Nene Giorgadze was born in the Soviet state of Georgia. She received her MA in Georgian Literature from Ilya University (Tbilisi, Georgia). In 1999, she moved from the Republic of Georgia to the U.S., and she now resides in Atlanta, Georgia. Her poems and translations have appeared or are forthcoming in Rhino, Cider Press Review, Nashville Review, Raleigh Review, and others.

Originally from Colorado, Timothy Kercher now lives in Kiev, Ukraine, after living in the Republic of Georgia for the past four years. He teaches high school English and is working in his fifth country overseas—Mongolia, Mexico, and Bosnia being the others. His poems and translations have appeared or are forthcoming in a number of recent literary publications, including Atlanta Review, The Dirty Goat, Poetry International Journal, The Evansville Review, Barnyard Poetry Magazine, Los Angeles Review, and others.

Translator Kercher’s Recommendations:

Microscope by Maya Sarishvili.

Collected Poems by Zviad Ratiani.

The Lame Doll by Besik Kharanauli.

Homepage photo via Flickr by Beatrice Zemann