Longlisted for the 2024ampamp160PEN Award for Poetry in Translation this prizewinning historicallyrical poem of 1985 on the unequal powerrelations between Russia and Ukraine darkly resonates in 2023.Alexei Parshchikovs long historical poem which dates 1985 is one of the major literary documents of the last years of the USSR. Alexandra Smith in an article of 2006 has called it ampamp34perhaps the most important achievement of Russian postperestroika poetry.ampamp34 Its significance is historical in its irony towards Peter the Great and Charles XII of Sweden in their 1709 battle at Poltava and towards the writers own dual allegiance to Ukrainian soil and the Russian language. While all previous translations of parts of the poem are in free verse translator Donald Wesling here carries over the rhyme and meter of the original whole poem.