Lushenko The World's Greatest Ice-Skater (Poem For Children) Poem by Eli Spivakovsky

Author's explanation of the poem



I'd like to explain this poem because it has a lot of layers to it. To begin with, Dudaim are really Biblical flowers believed to be either violets or mandrakes, but no one is sure which. They also, purportedly, have an aphrodisiac effects when given to people. The haziness around their true identity and their stimulative affect made them a perfect metaphor for a performance enhancing drug. Lushenko is not really eating violets or mandrakes and that's why those words are in quotation marks. These flower names are his slang for the performance enhancing drugs he is 'using'. The drugs make him feel like a god which is why, when he dreams of his 'victory lap around' Saturn, he feels like he 'owns the Solar System'. Saturn's icy rings even have 'different compositions', a reference to chemicals and drugs. He also feels 'angelic', as well as god-like, meaning he has no feelings of guilt about his cheating. Just as the 'angelic' children who later help clear the rink, provide him with this on-going feeling that he is in the right.

The description of 'Triple-Toe' etc. are technical terms to describe ice-skating. The lists of these techniques in the orders I gave them are actually impossible to skate (at least, no one has done them so far) . It's a device to make Lushenko appear beyond excellence. They're also written as if Lushenko is chanting them as like a private mantra - his personal, deep secret. They could also be a school-yard chant meant to emphasise how ice-skating has now become so easy (with the help of drugs) that it's like child's-play to him. Either way, they are meant to be primal. I also see them as a kind of magic spell he is casting over the ‘magical' ingredients he has ingested. As well, as a spell he is trying to cast over his girlfriend, his country, the Judges, the audience, and the greater public.

When he bumps into his former self in his dream, he is confronted with the truth of his actions. The Dudaim are stuffed into his hands because he has made his ‘hands dirty' by using them and because that way he is forced to be ‘in full possession' of his drugs. Therefore, he wants to retaliate by erasing that part of his life (or conscience.) So, 'in return', he gives his former self Oleander which is a poisonous flower. He is trying to kill his former self with a 'swift poison' as he claims his former self never truly cared for swiftness. 'Well, maybe in your way', meaning his former self cared to an extent about being the best, but not enough that he was prepared to take drugs to enhance his performance. (However, he is disturbed by the dream and compensates by training 'the whole next day', and it awakens his nostalgia enough that he recalls his time in St. Petersburg.) As a result of his conflicted conscience, he dissociates from his humanness and begins describing everyone and everything in flower metaphors.

The drugs are turning him into a metaphorical flower, 'growing inside his feet'. He sees his girlfriend this way too and she soon becomes complicit and turns into a flower herself. His powerful athleticism has 'transfixed' her in both senses of the word: she is both ‘motionless with astonishment' but also 'pierced by a weapon'. He has begun to kill her humanness just as he attempted to kill his former self in his dream. The 'momentary cloud' is also linked to his 'oxygen' source later on. It could also signify temporary visual evidence. And when they leave the frozen lake behind (metaphorically as well since it is a natural phenomenon rather than an artificial rink) , the 'sculptured footprints' from his ice-skates, also give away no proper evidence as to what has just happened. Just as there are no witnesses since there is 'no one else around.' In the same way, he has made sure there is no evidence of his drug use.

Her transformation into a plant begins when they kiss and her 'blossom' lips start 'curling up' meaning that her human self is beginning to wither and change into a flower as a result of his prowess. It is a 'freezing kiss' because they are in cold Saint Petersburg and because he is stopping her human development just as she has witnessed his athletic one. All the motion and movement in this poem comes from him. She is like a satellite caught in the gravitational pull of his 'solar system'. She moves up socially and financially in the poem, but only in relation to him. She is 'transfixed' again towards the end of the poem, 'wait[ing]' in his dressing room. However, 'the secret' they share stops her from being a spectator and so she is a 'rare flower' indeed. By the end of the poem, she has become so passive, she exists only to provide him 'oxygen to the carbon dioxide he breathes' (and as a social accompaniment) . This is yet another, flower allusion: plant respiration. She is in 'denial' of his use of drugs because he has gotten her used to an expensive life-style that allows her to wear 'a designer piece'. His 'secret' is now lodged where once only her 'blossom' was. When he and his girlfriend go to celebrate, they feast on '5-star protein and edible leaves'. He is always trying to maintain his competitive edge through his special 'diet'; and he uses his wealth to keep this edge - his power over her and his larger audience - by brazenly and exclusively consuming expensive 'edible leaves' in public.

The fact that the audience wants 'a little bit more every time' is another justification for his drug abuse. In a sense, he and his audience are united in their wanting more: they are both greedy for excellence. Brazenly, yet again, the music score for his performance has a flower theme. He is putting his cheating right under everyone's nose, but ‘no one smells the flower'. He feels rewarded by their 'rain' of flowers that they throw at him at the end of his performance. It is a 'rain' in the sense that the flowers are falling on him from spectators above, but also a 'rain' that his flower-self needs in order to keep 'growing'. It's also a 'rain' of 'roses' - a flower associated with adoration and devotion. It's another victory lap, but so essential to him that he calls it his 'encore'. The 'angelic children' who surround him create a paradisiacal image of this all-consuming moment.

Russia is also made complicit since they will 'claim the prize' and the public will never 'make the link' between him and his country which suggests that Russia knows he's cheating. When he 'makes himself level with the Judge's eyes', he is being 'bold', and at the same time, it is a hint that he and the Judge are on the same 'level', that they are both involved in the same Ruse. Also, he is focused on one 'Judge' not all of them (several Judges are used in Ice-skating competitions) which suggests a purposeful discrimination has been made. He is therefore confident that 'no one will tell' since he has neutralised all the evidence and witnesses; he can never be exposed and 'no one [else] will know'.

Lushenko seems triumphant and in control of his destiny. The Dudaim seem to be like his servants 'follow[ing]suit' and 'do[ing] what they're told.' But there's another interpretation to the phrasing. The Dudaim have become sentient. Perhaps his humanness has been deferred to them? They may only be going along with Lushenko for now, but it is not certain this will always be the case. The Dudaim get the last (and first) word in this poem. Lastly, there is a flower reference in his name, 'Lushenko' and his younger nickname, 'Lushy'. The word, 'Lush', literally means ‘vegetation growing luxuriantly' and ‘sexually attractive' and he is, of course all 3: wealthy, seductive and plant-like with nothing and no one - except maybe the Dudaim - to stop him from 'growing' and ‘excelling' even more.