I was lost in Janis Joplin’s raw mezzo-soprano
when Nadya moved from Moscow to Minneapolis. 
She grew up with the restrictions of Brezhnev
& curbed her creativity into the Periodic Table
of Chemical Elements – titanium, cobalt
& tungsten. She fell asleep to the turbulent
 
wheat & starlight of Van Gogh & starry-eyed
brushstrokes of Chagall – rooster feathers,
goat heads & lovers floating in the Russian sky. 
Nadya moved to the States & leased a subsidized
studio near Lake Harriet. Stuffed her pockets
 
with rocks swirled with acrylics & glitter-glue.
She gave them away compulsively. Treated
me to Beethoven’s Symphony #5
on the orchestra’s get-in-free day. I wore a black
velvet bolero & turquoise eardops. She dressed
in a secondhand white silk blouse & baby
 
blue fringed poncho. Saturated in marijuana
& Led Zeppelin, I finally surrender to the
spell of woodwind & deep cello. Grief
& jubilance shoot through my bones. When Nadya
discovered an American grocery with it’s whole cream,
lobster & double chocolate cake, she squalled with joy.