Instead of a preface

Anna Akhmatova born in 1889, under Soviet rule, suffered many imprisonments of her son Lev that the Stalin government encouraged, due to her writings. Her writings were confiscated and her friends had even testified against Anna. Anna is one of my favorite writers and she will be posted more then once here. Not a soul writes about the "pain " of watching everyday hourlessly,mercilessly, and patiently waiting for families to come from beyond those walls, as well as Anna Akhmatova. I begin with Anna's courage , to give you the courage to write what you really see. Called "half nun,half harlot" by the government she was also heavily censored and for her son's release wrote for the Stalin governement , to no avail. She later asked that these writing's be removed.

In the awful days of the Yezhovschina I passed seventeen months in the outer waiting line of the prison visitors of Leningrad. Once, somebody "identified " me there. Then a woman, standing behind me in the line, which of course, never heard my name, waked up from the torpor, typical for us all there, and asked me , whispering in my ear ( all spoke only in a whisper there)
" And can you describe this?"
And I answered:
"Yes, I can."
Then the weak similarity glided over that, what had once been her face.
April 1, 1957; Leningrad
http://http//www.poetryloverspage.com/poets/akhmatova/akhmatova_ind.html