Since winning the Moscow Count prize last month, Vladimir Gandelsman has been showing up everywhere. OpenSpace.ru posted videos of him reading a poem of his own and a poem by Lev Danovsky, and several new poems were just published in Новый журнал (The New Review) and Октябрь (October). In the first selection, I particularly liked the poem "Элегия" ("Elegy"), which seems to contemplate the absence of none other than the poet himself: "To sink my teeth so deeply into the world that it ... cannot let me go. / What a floor this is! / Hardwood, pine, ice, sea, sky, / or what have you – without me you're empty and feeble!" ("Так впиться в мир, чтоб он ... меня не отпустил, – / каков настил! – / дощатый, хвойный, ледяной, морской, небесный, / любой – ты без меня пустой и пресный!")
