At the Congress of Belarusian Scholars in September 2025, Angela Espinosa Ruiz spoke about Łarysa Hienijuš’s collection of poems for children. Children’s literature is by no means the best-known aspect of the poetess’ work, but her poem about the cuckoo made the audience of the presentation gasp and start exchanging glances.
Kukavala,
Usiu viesnu praliatala
Ziaziuliečka lia siala
I hniaździečka nie źvila
Ni z listočkaŭ,
Ni z halinkaŭ,
Ni z salomin,
Ni z pušynkaŭ.
[
Cuckooed, / All spring long flew / The little cuckoo by the village / And didn’t build a nest / Not from leaves, / Not from twigs, / Not from straws, / Not from down. ]
The audience’s unexpected emotional response seems to stem from the image firmly associated with Łarysa Hienijuš in Belarusian literature. For example, her best-known work was published under the title Ptuški biez hniozdaŭ [Birds Without Nests]. This book is a memoir recounting her coming of age under Polish occupation, her life in Prague, her arrest and deportation to the Soviet Union, eight years in labor camps, and her return to Belarus.
In Hienijuš’s original drafts, the book was titled Sto ranaŭ u serca [Hundred Wounds in the Heart,] but Belarusian archaeologist Mikhas Černiausky, to whom we owe the preservation of this text, decided to publish it under the title Spoviedź [Confession] immediately after the poetess’ death. Scholars of Belarusian poetry have often criticized Černiausky for this title. The basis for this choice was the deep faith permeating Hienijuš’s life and work. However, the fact is that her memoirs are not an attempt to cast off the sins of the past or to repent. It is the story of how the poetess, political activist, daughter, and mother remained unbroken in her struggle for a free Belarus and never once backed down, even after receiving “a hundred wounds to the heart.”
Łarysa Hienijuš was born into a peasant family in Western Belarus, which at that time was part of the
“Ethnographic” poems with a civic fervor, which were popular at the time, seemed insufficient to her. A little later, she would become fascinated by Maksim Tank, one of the key philosophers of Belarusian poetry, who is known today for his poignant meditations, invariably linked to the vastness of biblical history. In the 1930s, Tank was an apocalyptic thinker and a Marxist who, along with Czesław Miłosz, was a member of the literary group “Żagary” [Sticks]. This was Tank that Hienijuš loved.
Her first collection of poems, Ad rodnych niŭ [From the Native Fields], was published in occupied Prague in 1942. Hienijuš saw the purpose of this collection as messianic: to support, unite, and give hope to Belarusians scattered across the world. Incidentally, the collection reveals a fascination with the idea of inter-Slavic ties—a grand, unfulfilled dream of neighbors singing songs together as members of the Slavic family. Hienijuš was exposed to this sentiment while living in interwar Czechoslovakia. She harbored a deep resentment toward “faithful Catholics”—Poles who persecuted and banned everything Belarusian during her formative years. But even while living in Nazi-occupied Prague, Hienijuš never developed any sympathy for the Soviets. Back in her youth, she was friends with communist agitators who had also suffered Polish persecution in Western Belarus. She supported them out of solidarity with “any kind of” protest and popular movement, but she characterized Marxism as completely “alien” and “unnatural” to the Belarusian mindset. Hienijuš was an essentialist and a democrat who was raised on the ideals of the French Revolution, which, for some unknown reason, had found their way into the village of Žlobaŭcy near Hrodna at the beginning of the 20th century.
The title of the collection, From the Native Fields, refers to Maksim Bahdanovič and his poem “Sluckija tkačychi” [The Weavers of Slutsk]: “Ad rodnych niŭ, ad rodnaj chaty / U panski dvor dzielia krasy / Jany, biazdoĺnyja, uziaty / Tkać zalatyja pajasy” [From their native fields, from their native home, / To the lord’s manor for beauty’s sake / They, the unfortunate ones, were taken / To weave golden belts]. It is telling that for her first collection, Hienijuš chose a title from the verses of the most modernist (and also the youngest and most tragic) Belarusian poet. In this collection, dedicated to “brothers and sisters in foreign lands,” Geniush essentially programs her Belarusian identity, which is rooted in the traditions of the
Miesiac-śviaščeńnik kadzić bliskučym siemieniem zor.
Sypliucca zory ŭ prysadzie na biely dziaŭčyny prypol.
(“Viačerniaja misteryja”)
[Crescent, a priest, incenses with the shimmering seed of the stars. / Stars rain down in the alley on the girl’s white hem. (“The Evening Mystery”)]
Navučyla maci rožu zamaŭliaci,
navučyla maci vohnik adlivać,
varahoŭ ŭsialiakich dlia spakoju ŭ chacie,
a tajëmny miesiac navučyŭ kachać.
(“Navučyla maci”)
[Mother taught how to charm away red sores, / mother taught how to drive away rashes, / all sorts of spells for peace in the home, / and the mysterious crescent taught to love. (“Mother Taught”)]
It is important to note that the militant pathos—which is precisely associated with “našanivian” poetics—takes on a feminist twist in Hienijuš’s work. Although the image of the warrior maiden was originally conceived by Mickiewicz (“Death of a Colonel,” “Grażyna”), Hienijuš reimagines the figure of the uncompromising female patriot—first, in a pacifist vein, and second, with an eye toward the realities of Belarusian women in the early 20th century.
Kali chočaš liubić
kali chočaš zdabyć
bielaruskaje serca dziaŭčyny
dyk-ža musiš ustać,
pamahčy razarvać
kajdany najmiliejšaj Krainy
(«Skažy»)
[If you want to love / if you want to acquire / the Belarusian heart of a girl / then go and stand up, / help tear / the chains of the most beloved Country (“Tell”)]
Ty pojdzieš u boj, a ja pluh pakiruju,
kania nakarmliu, napaju, —
i tak abaronim, zasiejem, zbudujem
Bielaruś darahuju svaju.
(«Bielaruska»)
[You will go into battle, and I will drive the plow, / feed the horse, give it water— / and that’s how we will defend, sow, build / dear Belarus of ours. (“Belarusian Woman”)]
Z vietram dzieravy abyйmalisia, nivy buйnyja kalychalisia...
Toĺki dzieŭčyny serca viernaje, nia chistalasia, byccam dzierava.
(«Dziaŭčyna»)
[The trees swayed in the wind, the lush fields rippled… / Only the girl’s heart is faithful, did not stir as though a tree. (“The Girl”)]
Paradoxically, Łarysa Hienijuš did not become president of Belarus solely because she was a woman. In 1943, Vasiĺ Zacharka, one of the members of the government of the Belarusian People’s Republic who had signed the document establishing the independent BPR in 1918,
A favorite pastime of some Belarusian literary scholars is to imagine how the poetics of certain authors might have unfolded had they not been forced to lay their talent on the altar of the national liberation movement. Following such observations, I’ll venture to suggest that Hienijuš could have become a Christian mystic. Her second collection, Spiritus flat ubi vult [“The Spirit Blows Where It Wills”], recently discovered in manuscript form, serves as confirmation of this. Although, of course, it is still impossible to imagine Hienijuš’s work without Belarus of hers. It would be fair to note that in this collection, she places the image of the Land in the realm of the sacred:
Viesialiŭsia, śmiajaŭsia ahoń,
čyrvanieŭ, jak zara-zaranica,
i zharaŭ na im biely moj koń,
i zharaŭ na im mužny moj rycar.
Jak z pahanskich, kurhannych časoŭ
jšli udovy na vohnišča śmierci,
ja, najboliej nieščasnaja z udoŭ,
svajmu rycaru kinula serca.
Uźniaŭsia ŭ nieba achviarny moj dym,
ros iz serca majho ahniavicaj,
i skroź śliozy ja bačyla ŭ im,
jak ažyŭ jznoŭ koń biely i rycar.
I siarod najciažejšych pakut
ja pavieryla sercam harotnym,
što z achviaraŭ nam zrodzicca cud,
što naš Rycar i Kraj nieśmiarotny.
(«Cud»)
[The fire laughed and roared, / blazed like the morning star, / and on it burned my white horse, / and on it burned my brave knight. // As in pagan, kurgans’ times / widows went to the death-fire, / I, the most unhappy of widows, / to my knight threw my heart. // My sacrificial smoke rose to the sky, / grew from my heart like a flame, / and through my tears I saw in it / how the white horse and the knight came to life again. // And amidst the gravest of torments / I believed with my sorrowful heart / that from the sacrifices a miracle will be born to us, / that our Knight and our Land are immortal. (“Miracle”)]
The knight here is clearly taken from the coat of arms of the BPR. The image of his resurrection is complex: it was important to Hienijuš to incorporate both the Christology of her homeland and pagan Slavic motifs—the “Kryvichian history”—which was being rediscovered by her contemporary, the writer Václav Lastovský.
However, Hienijuš did not always construct her own mythology. Sometimes a single metaphor was enough for her. For example, in her memoirs, she referred to the camp by no name other than “Hehenna” (“Gehenna”).
After her experience in the camp, Hienijuš’s Christian Platonism disappears entirely. Her third collection, Nievadam z Niomana [“With the Seine Net from the Neman”], published after the author’s return to Belarus, focuses more on expanding on themes that describe the quest for freedom, but the depth of her earlier work disappears.
Dosyć! Alach ŭžo hubliaje pakornych.
Boliej nie strašny kryvavy kapryz.
Lia piramidaŭ narodnaha hora
budučynia ustaje, jak śfinks.
(“Jehipiet? Jehipiet”)
[Enough! Allah is already losing the submissive. / A bloody whim is no longer feared. / By the pyramids of popular sorrow / the future rises like a sphinx. (“Egypt? Egypt”)]
Łarysa Hienijuš’s home in Zeĺva was a well-known gathering place for dissidents. Perhaps the most famous of contemporary Belarusian poets, Alieś Razanaŭ (1947–2021), used to come there, which, in turn, contributed to his expulsion from the Belarusian State University's literature department. Neither Łarysa nor her husband, Janka, ever accepted Soviet citizenship.
Łarysa Hienijuš has still been rehabilitated only in part. Local authorities are refusing to allow a commemorative plaque to be placed on her house. Last year, her monument disappeared from Zeĺva: rumors are circulating that “our own” hid it “till better times.”