Shushan Avagyan: Postcard

Left from Tbilisi today – took a minibus – the road back was spectacular – slowly moving southward to Yerevan. The corporate buildings have no grace here – they turn into chains of naked mountains – each crowned with a church. Meadows of the red, of the yellow, of the violet flowers hand-sewn on a bishop’s regalia – endless fields of golden wheat. Scenery changes in a blink – highways become narrow and unpredictable, serpentine is the word – and the need to completely trust the driver is intoxicating. Cemeteries – scattered on the edge of the road – old and new, with ornamental cross-stones and pictures of the dead, irises – metastasized around the graves – all well taken care of – and yet there is no sign of any locals or villages nearby. Indeed – we are a funerary society.

This piece has previously appeared on the
SEGUE website.
We reproduce it here by kind permission of the author.