The Guest at the Door: The Poetry of Olga Sedakova

What follows is intended as a commentary on an observation by Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi: “Accompanied by the changing colors of Sedakova’s (iridescent) poetics, the reader journeys to the soul’s innermost depths in search of an authentic self, encountering various tropes and emotions (or attachments) along the way, which contrast with the poet’s unwavering resistance, incredulity, and bewilderment before the senselessness of worthless apparitions.”¹ Here is a house with many doors. As in a fairy tale, one of them is always locked. Perhaps we should say that it is always open, and thus seen by no one. Someday the poet will