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Caucasus
To Jacques de Balmont—French friend of the Ukrainians who perished in the Circassian war.
The Czars used the Ukrainians as tools in their ambitious projects. A hundred thousand of them perished in the marshes, digging the foundations of Petrograd. As many more died in the attempt to subdue the Circassians—tribes inhabiting the Caucasus mountains—to the imperial will of the Russian autocrat.
The memory of these sufferings was the inspiration of this bitter poem.
The text is taken from the prophecy of Jeremiah, Chapter 9, verse 1.
"Oh, that my head were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people."
