Yana Kane
Yana Kane was born in the Soviet Union. She came to the U.S. as a refugee at the age of 16. She holds a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from Princeton University and a Ph.D. in Statistics from Cornell University. She works as a Senior Principal Engineer. Most of her literary publications are in Russian (in magazines and anthologies). In the last few years, she started writing English and bilingual texts. Her poems and translations appeared in Chronogram, Ritualwell, Moving Words, Trouvaille Review, and The Red Wheelbarrow. A bilingual book of poetry and translations, Kingfisher / Zimorodok, came out in 2020.
Peapod
A green wall rises before me. It is so tall and extends so far to the sides that it makes up the entire visible world. The wall is not solid: it is an intricate lacework of sun-dappled vines, tendrils, leaves, moth-like flowers and crescent pods.
I extend a curious, eager hand. My grandmother has just shown me how to perform a miracle: to pick a peapod and pop it open, so it reveals a row of peas. (Oh! Aha! Peas, a food I have only seen come out of a can, grow on plants!)
I grasp a fat pod; it fills my small hand completely. I tug, and it separates from the vine, becomes mine. I press it with my thumbs, just like my grandmother did. To my astonishment, the magic works for me, too. The pod softly pops open its translucent wings. I touch the satiny, misty-green orbs one by one. As I try to scoop them out with my thumb, I am clumsy in my excitement and inexperience. Two peas drop to the ground, but three are captured by my palm. I place them in my mouth and bite. They crunch. My entire being is flooded with a primordial joy, with a sweetness that is green, green, green, and dappled with sunlight.
This is my earliest memory. Decades of time, the expanse of an ocean separate me from that summer day, that vegetable garden.
Every year, I plant peas in the barely thawed soil, then eagerly watch for the sharp green beaks to hatch and stretch towards the sun. The stems grow, open leaves, send out tendrils and find supports to climb up, up into the warming spring air. Flowers appear; they turn into pods. And there it is—my Garden of Eden. No forbidden trees, no evil temptation, no angry God. It is the realm of the Grandmother-Goddess. She opens the first peapod.