I walk along the alley with three scarlet carnations in my hands. People walk past me, young and old, cheerful and sad, and they all carry flowers. The avenue is long, tall trees lined its sides. It seems to me that I was in a large corridor with a blue ceiling – the sky. And all this is some kind of solemn: the sky, the sun, and the trees. And people. What happened? I turn around – my parents are coming from behind, they are talking animatedly about something. Daddy and mom are around, it means everything is in order. But some unusual feeling does not leave me. Why did my mother let me put on my favorite dress today, white in a red flower? Why dad bought these carnations and gave them to me? What to do with them? And where are we going? Here is the end of the alley… In front of me the monument is a tall, very tall woman, at her feet a mountain of flowers. A lot of people are around, the orchestra is playing. And something is beating rhythmically and loudly. I’m
scared, I throw myself at my father. He grabs me in my arms and says: “Do not be afraid, daughter, today is a holiday, so there are so many people here.” Many years ago on this day our army drove the fascists out of Kharkov and there was never a war in the city again! ” The war… It seems that people were killed there, they wounded my grandfather… And my grandfather and his friends drove the fascists out of our city… Grandfather often has a pain in his leg… Probably all Kharkov was hurt… “Dad, and the city was hurt when the fascists went on it? ” – I ask. “Yes,” replies Dad, “Kharkov was very painful, the Nazis destroyed many houses, killed many people, and our survivors were” treated “for a long time, and your grandfather” treated. “He rebuilt the ruined houses, and the university where we with mum studied, “Tuk-tuk, tuk-tuk…” And what’s that knocking? “- I’m interested.” The heart of this woman, “says the father.” But it’s not alive, “I object.”
Inanimate. Her name is Motherland. And her heart is alive, real. It always remembers those of her daughters and sons who perished. They saved her, and us and you. It is sad, lives in grief. “I did not know what” grief “is. But I slip from Papa’s hands and run to this sad and, I think, kind woman. I leave the carnations at her feet and return to my parents. – tuk, tuk-tuk, tuk-tuk… It always remembers those of her daughters and sons who perished. They saved her, and us and you. It is sad, lives in grief. “I did not know what” grief “is. But I slip from Papa’s hands and run to this sad and, I think, kind woman. I leave the carnations at her feet and return to my parents. – tuk, tuk-tuk, tuk-tuk… It always remembers those of her daughters and sons who perished. They saved her, and us and you. It is sad, lives in grief. “I did not know what” grief “is. But I slip from Papa’s hands and run to this sad and, I think, kind woman. I leave the carnations at her feet and return to my parents. – tuk, tuk-tuk, tuk-tuk…
This was the first day of liberation of Kharkov, which I remembered. I was then four years old. Then many times on August 23rd celebrated this holiday. But that day, spent at the memorial, I see clearly and clearly, as if yesterday I visited there.
