On Common Ground: Two Poets Speak

About the Book

About the Author

As a married woman, I moved to the beautiful city of Saint Petersburg, and there I gave birth to my only son, Sergey. My marriage wasn’t happy, and I brought up my only child alone. I worked in high school as a teacher of Russian literature. I liked my work because I liked Russian writers and poets, but I never wrote stories or poems in Russian – I didn’t think about doing that. When my son and his family left our former country for America in 1989, I followed them. Although I had never before studied English, I tried to learn the new language, and on October 11, 1995, I passed the examination for citizenship and became an American citizen. I was happy to meet in America the very nice people who became my friends. I was grateful to them for their help and kindness and wanted to express my feelings. I began to write short stories and poems in English. My writings were born by a very strong feeling of gratitude to my American friends. They liked my writings and believed that they would be published. American poet Helena Levine-Ryan likes my poems, too. We realized that we feel the same way and we decided to make on combined book of our poetry. We believe that our poems can express people’s feelings and their eagerness for life and pace all over the world.