sirens filled the air
police cars with flashing blue lights
at the end of the crescent
Heart in mouth…
I’m through the door. Home.
‘What’s polonium’? my daughter asks
I’m puzzled …taking the paper from her
-scan in rising panic
snippets of words like ‘not a danger’
‘radiation not a threat’ and ‘far enough away’
I turn on the news
-mouth agape – I see and hear
a neighbour’s been poisoned
(via a cup of tea)
he is a father
I don’t know his son
he is a husband
I’ve never spoken to his wife
he is a neighbour
yet invisible to me
and
he was a Russian spy
oh dear!
©Vivian Zems
Alexander Litvinenko was a former officer of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) and KGB, who fled from court prosecution in Russia and received political asylum in the United Kingdom. I had no idea he was our neighbour.
We only became aware of his existence when police flooded our street (early November 2006). It didn’t help when we then spotted a white tent by Litvinenko’s front door and more people in hazmat suits. The police told us that the traces of polonium in our neighbourhood were ‘negligible’.
He’d lived a quiet life on our street…and we’d known nothing about his existence- until he named his murderer from his public deathbed on national television.
June 30, 2018 at 8:15 pm
riveting, Vivian! Talk about six degrees of separation! You’re tone and diction were so spot on! 🙂
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June 30, 2018 at 8:25 pm
Thanks Frank! I really wasn’t sure how to ‘wax lyrical’ about such a serious thing. Glad it made sense. 🙂
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June 30, 2018 at 9:26 pm
Oh, it made sense! 🙂 I still can’t believe that guy in the news was your neighbor! Whoa!
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July 1, 2018 at 1:27 am
We were shocked too!
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June 30, 2018 at 9:32 pm
Holy moly! That is fascinating!
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July 1, 2018 at 1:42 am
Yes, it sure was. Thanks for commenting 🙂
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June 30, 2018 at 9:44 pm
What a chilling experience… such an event we all have heard about, and now was back in the news again.
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July 1, 2018 at 1:41 am
It was surreal at the time…everyone checking what polonium was etc. I felt bad that the drama of the situation overshadowed the agony his family must have been going through.
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July 1, 2018 at 2:44 am
kaykuala
They somehow manage to keep to themselves and avoid detection. The security of the the country not just the neighborhood was very much at stake. It wams scary when discovered
Hank.
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July 1, 2018 at 12:06 pm
It sure was… thanks for commenting Hank😊
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July 1, 2018 at 1:39 pm
That’s a fabulous perspective…very well written Vivian.
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July 1, 2018 at 1:49 pm
Thanks Rajani!
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July 1, 2018 at 1:44 pm
Wow, Vivian, this is quite a story! Know thy neighbour, indeed. Poor guy–no one deserves to die like that.
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July 1, 2018 at 1:50 pm
It was so sad… but worse that his demise was eclipsed by the drama. Thank you
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July 1, 2018 at 2:02 pm
Wow, Alexander Litvinenko lived on your street! And your daughter knew about the polonium before you – how scary, Viv!
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July 1, 2018 at 5:55 pm
It really was…. and very confusing for us all.
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July 1, 2018 at 3:03 pm
Oh my goodness. First i thought this was for the speculative fiction prompt and thought how well you told it. Even more striking to know it was true. Officials always say radiation is negligible etc. I never believe them.
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July 3, 2018 at 7:53 pm
Ha! Neither did we-at the time😳
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July 1, 2018 at 6:18 pm
My goodness Vivian this is quite a story! Sigh.. nobody deserves to die like that 😥 poor guy..
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July 2, 2018 at 3:01 pm
I know, right?
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July 1, 2018 at 6:23 pm
It is a scary world we live in Vivian, secrets behind closed doors.
Anna :o]
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July 2, 2018 at 3:01 pm
Indeed, Anna!
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July 1, 2018 at 9:10 pm
Wow–that is scary! What a vibrant poem!
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July 3, 2018 at 7:53 pm
Thank you 😊
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July 1, 2018 at 10:08 pm
Whew, what an experience; and you captured it so very well in poetry. This poem is a keeper, as it preserves the memory. Really shows that there are many things one might not know about one’s neighbors.
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July 2, 2018 at 12:02 am
Thanks Mary, It’s so true…we didn’t know. And I suppose he wouldn’t have advertised it either.
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July 2, 2018 at 1:46 am
Well done!!!!!
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July 2, 2018 at 1:28 pm
Thank you!
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July 2, 2018 at 1:52 am
This is brilliant writing! Loved what you did with ‘he is a father … etc.’ … though you had me at ‘sirens filled the air’.
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July 2, 2018 at 1:28 pm
Thanks, Wendy!
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July 2, 2018 at 1:57 am
What an incredibly sad but rivetting poem. When we read of such happenings in the newspapers we are shocked but it is somewhere else, it doesn’t happen near us. But then we are thrown in the deep end struggling with the knowledge we are just a door or two away from headline newsand then conjure up in our minds all the what ifs and the horror of it all. Brilliant write Vivian.
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July 2, 2018 at 1:28 pm
Thanks, Robin 🙂
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July 2, 2018 at 2:31 am
It’s so difficult to get to know people who are determined not to be known. I suspect that even if you had made the effort to learn more about him, what he allowed to be seen would not have been enough to suspect something like this. Terrifying… and so telling, when it comes to the sort of world we live in.
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July 2, 2018 at 1:28 pm
I quite agree, Magaly!
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July 2, 2018 at 3:40 am
Sometimes, however, our neighbor does not want to be known…and for good reason.
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July 2, 2018 at 1:20 pm
Indeed!
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July 2, 2018 at 10:14 am
This is an awesome piece. Well written
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July 2, 2018 at 1:20 pm
Thanks, Rotimi!
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July 2, 2018 at 3:01 pm
My pleasure
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July 2, 2018 at 1:33 pm
Wonderful write!!
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July 2, 2018 at 8:39 pm
Thanks Annell!
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July 2, 2018 at 6:47 pm
Wow! It is scary at time what you don’t know about your neighbors.
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July 2, 2018 at 8:40 pm
Absolutely!
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July 3, 2018 at 3:53 am
Wow! That’s almost too close for comfort. Nice writing, Vivian.
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July 3, 2018 at 7:51 pm
Thanks Sarah😊
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July 4, 2018 at 2:18 am
This neighbour would have been quite good at anonymity (though not good enough to escape his enemies). But the poem also points to our increasing isolation from our neighbours. I do know mine – but I joke, truthfully, that I never see them unless I bump into them downtown.
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July 4, 2018 at 7:53 pm
So true… how we’re nearer, yet so far apart!
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