Page:Poems of the Great War - Cunliffe.djvu/62

 36 ALTER BRODY

��I am in the market-place -^

At a Fair ;

The market-place is a heaving mass of carts and

horses and oxen ; The oxen are lowing, the horses are neighing, the

peasants are cursing in a dozen different dia- lects — I am in Grandfather's store, On the lower end of the market-place, right opposite

the public well — The store is full of peasants and peasant women,

bargaining at the top of their voices ; The men are clad in rough sheepskin coats and fur

caps; The women are gay in bright-colored cottons and

wear red kerchiefs around their heads ; My Grandfather is standing behind the counter

measuring out rope to some peasants; Grandmother is cutting a strip of linen for a peasant

woman, chaffering with another one at the same

time, about the price of a pair of sandals — And I am sitting there, behind the counter, on a

sack of flour. Playing with my black-eyed little cousin —

Kartushkiya-Beroza ! Kartushkiva-Beroza ! It comes back to me suddenly —

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