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Motherfield: Poems & Belarusian Protest Diary
A poetry collection where personal is inevitably political and ecological, Motherfield is a poet’s insistence on self-determination in authoritarian, patriarchal Belarus.
Julia Cimafiejeva was born in an area of rural Belarus that became a Chernobyl zone during her childhood. The book opens with a poet’s diary recording the course of violence unfolding in Belarus since its 2020 presidential election.
Motherfield paints an intimate portrait of the poet’s struggle with fear, despair, and guilt as she goes to protests, escapes police, longs for readership, learns about the detention of family and friends, and ultimately chooses life in exile. But can she really escape the contaminated farmlands of her youth and her Belarusian mother tongue? Can she escape the radiation of her motherfield?
This is the first collection of Julia Cimafiejeva’s poetry in English, prepared by cotranslators and poets Valzhyna Mort and Hanif Abdurraqib.
Julia Cimafiejeva was born in an area of rural Belarus that became a Chernobyl zone during her childhood. The book opens with a poet’s diary recording the course of violence unfolding in Belarus since its 2020 presidential election.
Motherfield paints an intimate portrait of the poet’s struggle with fear, despair, and guilt as she goes to protests, escapes police, longs for readership, learns about the detention of family and friends, and ultimately chooses life in exile. But can she really escape the contaminated farmlands of her youth and her Belarusian mother tongue? Can she escape the radiation of her motherfield?
This is the first collection of Julia Cimafiejeva’s poetry in English, prepared by cotranslators and poets Valzhyna Mort and Hanif Abdurraqib.
131 pages, Kindle Edition
Published November 22, 2022
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351 people want to read
About the author
Julia Cimafiejeva
14 books54 followersJulia Cimafiejeva (Юля Цімафеева) (born in 1982) is a Belarusian writer and translator. She is an author of six poetry collections in Belarusian and a documentary book “Minsk Diary” written in English. Her works have been translated into many languages and appeared in different projects, anthologies and magazines. Her recent titles in German are Der Angststein. Gedichte (edition.fotoTAPETA, 2022) and Minsk. Die Stadt, die ich vermisse. Fotografie. Gedichte (EDITIONfrölich, 2022). Cimafiejeva’s debut American book Motherfield: Poems & Belarusian Protest Diary translated by Valzhyna Mort and Hanif Abdurraqib (2022 by Deep Vellum) was long-listed for American PEN Award for Poetry in Translation and shortlisted for Derek Walcott Prize for Poetry
She translates mostly from English and Norwegian. She translated books by Walt Whitman, Stephen Crane, Paul Celan, Maja Lunde and Stian Hole, contributed her translations of poetry and prose to different magazines and anthologies. She is the winner of Carlos Sherman Translation Prize for the translation of the poetry book by Stephen Crane. Since 2020, she has been living in exile.
She translates mostly from English and Norwegian. She translated books by Walt Whitman, Stephen Crane, Paul Celan, Maja Lunde and Stian Hole, contributed her translations of poetry and prose to different magazines and anthologies. She is the winner of Carlos Sherman Translation Prize for the translation of the poetry book by Stephen Crane. Since 2020, she has been living in exile.
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Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews
January 29, 2023
4.5/5
A really stunning piece of art. I had never heard of Cimafiejeva’s work before, but came across this book when I saw that my favorite poet, Hanif Abdurraqib, was one of the translators and editors who worked on this English release and was immediately intrigued, as I have never read a Belarusian author in translation.
The protest diary that opens this book really puts you into the author’s world and frame of mind immediately, making clear the struggles and fears of living in a place like Belarus — where you can live under a president that you never voted for most of your life, in constant fear that protest will end in arrest, torture or death. I was also particularly moved by the poems that addressed nuclear disaster and Chernobyl, which were really breathtaking.
The poems in this collection are presented both in Cimafiejeva’s native Belarusian and translated into English, and some pieces originally written in English and edited by the translators. A fantastic collaboration, and one that I hope continues for more of this writer’s work.
A really stunning piece of art. I had never heard of Cimafiejeva’s work before, but came across this book when I saw that my favorite poet, Hanif Abdurraqib, was one of the translators and editors who worked on this English release and was immediately intrigued, as I have never read a Belarusian author in translation.
The protest diary that opens this book really puts you into the author’s world and frame of mind immediately, making clear the struggles and fears of living in a place like Belarus — where you can live under a president that you never voted for most of your life, in constant fear that protest will end in arrest, torture or death. I was also particularly moved by the poems that addressed nuclear disaster and Chernobyl, which were really breathtaking.
The poems in this collection are presented both in Cimafiejeva’s native Belarusian and translated into English, and some pieces originally written in English and edited by the translators. A fantastic collaboration, and one that I hope continues for more of this writer’s work.
March 9, 2023
4.5 🌟
1986
'No matter how hard
our forgiving dead
begged them from their freshly
cleaned graves,
neither houses, nor gardens,
nor apple trees
forgave us.'
About her family home in the Chernobyl zone.
Language Is A Prison Sentence
'For our resistance,
for our inability
to absorb the whole world.
We want poems made
out of barbed wire,
so that when we throw ourselves upon them in flight
we might feel alive.'
My European Poem
'So, forgive me my nagging in a half-broken English,
My Eastern European never-ending complaints,
As having read the books you've read,
I still want to have a hope,
I still believe I have a right to a hope,
That beaten hope that builds its nest
On my roof and sings
In Belarusian
(Not in Russian).'
1986
'No matter how hard
our forgiving dead
begged them from their freshly
cleaned graves,
neither houses, nor gardens,
nor apple trees
forgave us.'
About her family home in the Chernobyl zone.
Language Is A Prison Sentence
'For our resistance,
for our inability
to absorb the whole world.
We want poems made
out of barbed wire,
so that when we throw ourselves upon them in flight
we might feel alive.'
My European Poem
'So, forgive me my nagging in a half-broken English,
My Eastern European never-ending complaints,
As having read the books you've read,
I still want to have a hope,
I still believe I have a right to a hope,
That beaten hope that builds its nest
On my roof and sings
In Belarusian
(Not in Russian).'
June 13, 2025
the poetry was okay, the protest diary was the better part of this
September 26, 2024
Harrowing and beautiful.
August 19, 2023
Truly an unforgettable read. Poet Julia Cimafiejeva shares her diary during the protests against Lukashenko’s brutal dictatorship in Belarus. The reader gets a real feel for the fear and danger and passion of being involved.
The poems in Motherfield with the original Belarus are a treasure, depicting the poet’s struggle with language, the post Chernobyl environment and the current protests against injustices and tyranny that reach back to Stalin.
This is a formidable collection of poems and a journal that helps us understand the terrible tragedy of post Soviet Belarus and Ukraine. Beyond that, protest poems can change the world, as Julia says. Thank you to Julia Cimafiejeva and to poet-translators Valzhyna Mort and Hanif Abdurraqib for this gift.
The poems in Motherfield with the original Belarus are a treasure, depicting the poet’s struggle with language, the post Chernobyl environment and the current protests against injustices and tyranny that reach back to Stalin.
This is a formidable collection of poems and a journal that helps us understand the terrible tragedy of post Soviet Belarus and Ukraine. Beyond that, protest poems can change the world, as Julia says. Thank you to Julia Cimafiejeva and to poet-translators Valzhyna Mort and Hanif Abdurraqib for this gift.
November 14, 2025
Intensely personal poems that reflect how dispiriting and suffocating it can feel living within the insanity of an authoritarian regime.
April 16, 2023
"A poet's body belongs to his motherland.
Motherland speaks through the poet's mouth...
And would you like my body, the body of a poetess?...
No, you don't need the body of a poetess.
It's mine."
Half poetry, half diary of the protests of Belarus. The writing is beautiful, even as the subject matter is heartbreaking. I was unaware of the situation in Belarus, but Julia Cimafiejeva does a good job of explaining what the protests were like and what it was like to live in Belarus during that time without the reader necessarily needing a lot of context.
Tw: death, murder, torture, police brutality, effects of radiation (Chernobyl)
Read in honor of National Poetry Month 2023.
Motherland speaks through the poet's mouth...
And would you like my body, the body of a poetess?...
No, you don't need the body of a poetess.
It's mine."
Half poetry, half diary of the protests of Belarus. The writing is beautiful, even as the subject matter is heartbreaking. I was unaware of the situation in Belarus, but Julia Cimafiejeva does a good job of explaining what the protests were like and what it was like to live in Belarus during that time without the reader necessarily needing a lot of context.
Tw: death, murder, torture, police brutality, effects of radiation (Chernobyl)
Read in honor of National Poetry Month 2023.
January 11, 2023
Heart wrenching and just beautiful. So happy I read it.
September 11, 2024
A slim volume that contains a record, a sharing to witness, a call for the world to know, and remember. An account of action in the face of dictatorship. A writer standing up, and then choosing to flee for her and her husband's life and freedom.
The first part is a year-long protest diary from August 2020 to March 2021, composed in English during a mass uprising around the 2020 presidential election in Belarus, until exile in Europe. Moments captured as it happens.
An insight into an experience familiar and yet from a place rarely do we receive news or stories from.
Sandwiched between the protest diary and the powerful My European Poem, are a collection of poems, published in both English and Belarusian. Poems of home and loss, exile and displacement, miscarriage and war.
My European Poem is very good, and a call to the world to know about the happenings in Belarus.
The first part is a year-long protest diary from August 2020 to March 2021, composed in English during a mass uprising around the 2020 presidential election in Belarus, until exile in Europe. Moments captured as it happens.
An insight into an experience familiar and yet from a place rarely do we receive news or stories from.
Sandwiched between the protest diary and the powerful My European Poem, are a collection of poems, published in both English and Belarusian. Poems of home and loss, exile and displacement, miscarriage and war.
My European Poem is very good, and a call to the world to know about the happenings in Belarus.
December 29, 2022
The book is based in facts but reads as a novel. Mostly smooth and straight forward. You do find poetic language as Cimafiejeva is a poet themselves. The picture-less words paint a picture of the horrors of just a few years ago as they unfold slowly, but surely. The diary entries are followed by poetry (first in the poet’s native language then translated into English). Overall, this book is for those who like history, literary stories, poetry and contemporary issues
April 26, 2024
Motherfield contains both journal entries relating to the elections in Belarus in 2020 and the hopes of its citizens for freedom, and poems relating to life in Belarus. I found the journal entries to be far more compelling than the poems--they were chilling and hopeful at the same time, until the reality and depth of control over that society became clear. I am looking forward to more works by Ms. Cimafiejeva.
February 18, 2024
Belarus
The synopsis of this book is such a important key to truly understand the context of this book and the poetry. This is a harrowing situation many of us can only ever imagine. ( See below).
Julia Cimafiejeva was born in an area of rural Belarus that became a Chernobyl zone during her childhood. The book opens with a poet’s diary recording the course of violence unfolding in Belarus since its 2020 presidential election.
Motherfield paints an intimate portrait of the poet’s struggle with fear, despair, and guilt as she goes to protests, escapes police, longs for readership, learns about the detention of family and friends, and ultimately chooses life in exile. But can she really escape the contaminated farmlands of her youth and her Belarusian mother tongue? Can she escape the radiation of her motherfield?
As the book switches between reading like a novel, to poetry and between the translations you can feel the raw emotion of what is being experienced. It's tense, thought provoking and so poignant. It's heart-breaking yet told in a beautiful way.
The synopsis of this book is such a important key to truly understand the context of this book and the poetry. This is a harrowing situation many of us can only ever imagine. ( See below).
Julia Cimafiejeva was born in an area of rural Belarus that became a Chernobyl zone during her childhood. The book opens with a poet’s diary recording the course of violence unfolding in Belarus since its 2020 presidential election.
Motherfield paints an intimate portrait of the poet’s struggle with fear, despair, and guilt as she goes to protests, escapes police, longs for readership, learns about the detention of family and friends, and ultimately chooses life in exile. But can she really escape the contaminated farmlands of her youth and her Belarusian mother tongue? Can she escape the radiation of her motherfield?
As the book switches between reading like a novel, to poetry and between the translations you can feel the raw emotion of what is being experienced. It's tense, thought provoking and so poignant. It's heart-breaking yet told in a beautiful way.
June 3, 2024
I’m so glad that a book like this exists. It opens with the authors protest diary from 2020-2021, following another ‘election’ in Belarus. Even during these entries she muses about what is the point of making art when the world is ending and especially in the post-Soviet world where leaders remain in charge in perpetuity and rights slowly get stripped away.
The first poem “the stone of fear” for lack of a better word absolutely gagged me. She also writes about her home becoming a Chernobyl exclusion zone, and the grief of not being able to explain why you had to leave.
INCREDIBLE!!!
The first poem “the stone of fear” for lack of a better word absolutely gagged me. She also writes about her home becoming a Chernobyl exclusion zone, and the grief of not being able to explain why you had to leave.
INCREDIBLE!!!
June 9, 2024
This book taught me a lot about the history of Belarus and the current politics there, which I really appreciated. The poetry, I'm not sure if some of it just didn't translate well into English, but many poems just didn't do it for me. But I did enjoy some, like Motherfield 1 and 2, and the English poem. Overall, a quick read that teaches me and has some nice poetry, I can't complain!
June 23, 2024
So beautiful and haunting. I picked this book up, honestly, because of the cover. I could have read an entire book of her protest diary, as I was enthralled by her story. I will be on the look out for more from this author, and for more readings on Belarus, as I found her story really impactful.
April 14, 2024
The darkness healed me a bit
April 28, 2024
This is one of the most spectacular collection of poems I've ever read.
March 30, 2025
Oh 😭
This book genuinely made me weep. It's a very good time to read it. That's all I'll say.
This book genuinely made me weep. It's a very good time to read it. That's all I'll say.
April 22, 2025
as long as women write poetry i will do my womanly job and support the poetesses!
June 1, 2025
i too have struggled to grow an avocado from a pit
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 29, 2024
Powerful.
Especially poignant to read today, as a convicted r@pist and felon was just elected as the 47th president of the USA.
“I feel as if election night has not ended yet, as if we are still living through the same long election day. I feel nausea.”
Especially poignant to read today, as a convicted r@pist and felon was just elected as the 47th president of the USA.
“I feel as if election night has not ended yet, as if we are still living through the same long election day. I feel nausea.”
February 12, 2024
A short work but strong feelings conveyed
December 11, 2024
I read this as part of a read around the world challenge. very powerful.
Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews