Сверчок
Если правду сказать,
я по крови — домашний сверчок,
Заповедную песню
пою над печною золой,
И один для меня
приготовит крутой кипяток,
А другой для меня
приготовит шесток Золотой.
Путешественник вспомнит
мой голос в далеком краю,
Даже если меня
променяет на знойных цикад.
Сам не знаю, кто выстругал
бедную скрипку мою,
Знаю только, что песнями
я, как цикада, богат.
Сколько русских согласных
в полночном моем языке,
Сколько я поговорок
сложил в коробок лубяной,
Чтобы шарили дети
в моем лубяном коробке,
В старой скрипке запечной
с единственной медной струной.
Ты не слышишь меня,
голос мой — как часы за стеной,
А прислушайся только —
и я поведу за собой,
Я весь дом подыму:
просыпайтесь, я сторож ночной!
И заречье твое
отзовется сигнальной трубой.
1940
Иванова ива
Иван до войны проходил у ручья,
Где выросла ива неведомо чья.
Не знали, зачем на ручей налегла,
А это Иванова ива была.
В своей плащ-палатке, убитый в бою,
Иван возвратился под иву свою.
Иванова ива,
Иванова ива,
Как белая лодка, плывет по ручью.
1958
Меркнет зрение ...
Меркнет зрение - сила моя,
Два незримых алмазных копья;
Глохнет слух, полный давнего грома
И дыхания отчего дома;
Жестких мышц ослабели узлы,
Как на пашне седые волы;
И не светятся больше ночами
Два крыла у меня за плечами.
Я свеча, я сгорел на пиру.
Соберите мой воск поутру,
И подскажет вам эта страница,
Как вам плакать и чем вам гордиться,
Как веселья последнюю треть
Раздарить и легко умереть,
И под сенью случайного крова
Загореться посмертно, как слово.
1977
Три Стихи
Арсе́ний Тарко́вский
Listen to 'Valya's Willow' read in the original Russian by the author:
Even if the Russian literary tradition does delve deep into the darkness and misery and mystery of human existence, the music of Russian poetry is so undeniable, so playful, so often ecstatic, and has persisted for so long, it suggests the secret pleasures of a people who have so long been written off as the stern patrons of unhappiness ("every unhappy family," etc. etc.). It is, indeed, what makes translating Russian poetry most difficult, and why readers of Russian poetry in translation—say, Akhmatova or Mandelstam—mainly receive a picture of a grim and absurd reality but not much of a sense of what it sounds like when a pure music collides with the grim or the absurd.
Arseny Tarkovsky's work emerges from a visionary sensibility—like Akhmatova and Mandelstam—that became his way of forging a life and a Russian art outside of Soviet realism. But it's the music of his poems that guaranteed his reputation, as much as the vision. Consider, for example, how "Valya's Willow" relies on the musical play in Russian between "Iva" (willow) and "Ivan." Perhaps one might translate this poem as "Will's Willow," which suggests the shared destiny of soldier and the tree of mourning—except that "Will" is such a distinctly English name it might confuse readers. Hence our choice of "Valya." "Valya," Dimitri Psurtsev reminded me after he saw my translation, is also the name of Tarkovsky's older brother, who died during the Russian Civil War.
—Philip Metres
Arseny Tarkovsky's work emerges from a visionary sensibility—like Akhmatova and Mandelstam—that became his way of forging a life and a Russian art outside of Soviet realism. But it's the music of his poems that guaranteed his reputation, as much as the vision. Consider, for example, how "Valya's Willow" relies on the musical play in Russian between "Iva" (willow) and "Ivan." Perhaps one might translate this poem as "Will's Willow," which suggests the shared destiny of soldier and the tree of mourning—except that "Will" is such a distinctly English name it might confuse readers. Hence our choice of "Valya." "Valya," Dimitri Psurtsev reminded me after he saw my translation, is also the name of Tarkovsky's older brother, who died during the Russian Civil War.
—Philip Metres
Arseny Tarkovsky (1907–1989) is one of the great Russian poets of the twentieth century. He survived the entire Soviet era—suffering a leg amputation during World War II—by his work as a translator of poetry. His renown grew with the publication of his first book in the 1950s, and again in the 1970s, when his son the filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky used readings of his father's poems in his films The Mirror and Stalker.
Philip Metres is the author and translator of a number of books and chapbooks, including Compleat Catalogue of Comedic Novelties (2014), A Concordance of Leaves (2013), abu ghraib arias (2011), and To See the Earth (2008). His work has garnered two NEA fellowships, the Watson Fellowship, five Ohio Arts Council Grants, the Beatrice Hawley Award, the Arab American Book Award, and the Cleveland Arts Prize. In 2014 he received a Creative Workforce Fellowship, thanks to the Community Partnership for Arts and Culture, residents of Cuyahoga County, and Cuyahoga Arts & Culture. He is a professor of English at John Carroll University in Cleveland. Click here for his website.
Dimitri Psurtsev is a Russian poet and translator of British and American authors. He teaches at Moscow State Linguistic University. His two books of poetry, Ex Roma Tertia and Tengiz Notepad, were published in 2001.
