(essay)

They say in Kherson, “We don`t celebrate Halloween, we live in it.”

After heavy artillery shelling by Russians, they go to put down the fire on the 8^th or 9^th floor of multistory houses, flooding all the apartments down the tower stairs to the first floor. Since then, they switch off lights, water and gas, spreading fungus and dampness everywhere, saving 2 apartments and spoiling 30 apartments at the same time. But what will you do? Halloween goes on and life under bombs and mines does not end.

Tortured trees and torn to pieces fountains, maimed monuments and mutilated mansions, looking like concentration camp convicts thrown out of Gulag, stare with empty eyes at a following bus with wounded and shot dead passengers…

“What for?” request school ruins.

“What for?” blubbers a burnt bird.

“What for?” whispers a weeping willow.

“Because we like our city…live on our land…and dream about our future?”

However, the rainbow ray of hope flared under the deluge of drizzle! Pronto-fronto! Wow, right now! Ukrainian marines are attacking the left-bank Krynky and Kozachi Laheri, the villages of Oleshky hromada!

The whole Kherson buzzes like a beehive – we succeed and step on and they retreat and run away! No! It is they who run away and retreat, as for us, we step on and succeed! All our dachas and summer cottages will be liberated, step by step, by and by! God will help us! Besides, don`t you know that almost all Ukraine is under the Bloody Aurora Borealis! It is an amazing auspice, good for us and bad for them! It`s a sign of our soon salvation from shells, mines, and bombs!

Like the majority of Kherson people, I feel ants in my pants…I believe in God, I believe in Oleshky, and I believe in Ukrainian marines too.