A waning crescent melting in the sky—
this is the profile of Svetlov, the poet.
The tips of his forehead and chin
reach for each other,
between them nests the clever smile
of a man from the city
once known as Yekaterinoslav.
Stooping, Svetlov
carries his leanness with an air of dignity.
“I live among shadows.
They surround me—
the friends of my youth.
Everyone else has gone . . .
What’s death?”
he asked.
Then answered:
“Just joining the majority.”
He said all this while sitting at a table
in a noisy cocktail lounge,
which he called the boiler room.
A born melancholic,
he took it upon himself
to amuse people,
and he gained fame as a joker—
as the Nasreddin Hodja
of our poetry.
He raised his cocktail to his lips,
lit a cigarette,
and asked another question:
“Another name for half a liter?”
Then answered:
“One big drop.”
Svetlov had not been a drinker,
but he became one.
He found it hard to believe
the turn his life had taken,
this sharp-witted mourner.
“All of a sudden, back in ’28
they summoned me—up there”
(a gesture with his index finger)
“and this is how they put it:
‘We know you—
“Grenada,” “Merry-making”—
so please get to know us,
help us flush out
these Trotskyists.’
‘But I’m a Trotskyist myself,’
I blurted out.
‘We know, that’s why
you’re the man to find them.’
(A pause—a whistling descent
from a high promontory into an abyss.)
‘Call round tomorrow, same time—
we await your answer.’
And so I went home from the Lubyanka.
It was agony, it was torture . . . I didn’t
know what to do with myself.
Went to bed—couldn’t sleep,
sat down—couldn’t sit,
got up—couldn’t stand . . .
What could I do?
I made it through the night
with difficulty.
Then, early in the morning,
came a ring at the door.
A fellow from back home,
a friend of my youth.
And not alone—but with a bottle.
Not just a bottle—
but with plenty food besides.
We drank—and I felt better.
We had another—I felt good.
One more—and I was flying high.
Then lunch—and life was swell,
couldn’t have been better, in this fine land of ours.
On legs of jelly
I went off to the Lubyanka.
‘What’s this, Svetlov?
Can’t even stand on your own two feet!
We don’t need drunkards.
Get out of here!’
They sent me packing—
what a present!
I started off for home—
my soul was singing,
and had no wish
to play around with rhymes . . .
‘The unresolvable can be resolved
so unexpectedly,
so accidentally
by such a simple method.
Moisture with degrees of proof,
genuine, unfalsified proof . . .’”
Svetlov stalled forever
on this simple, reliable,
tried-and-true method
of answering the irrelevant
and tactless questions
posed by life . . .
Svetlov sipped from his glass,
lit up again—
with relish, his head in the clouds.
His silence lasted
a long time.
When he came to, he said:
“Our talk today’s
been much too dismal . . .
My fault.
Let’s take a break from all this wit.
Let’s walk through Moscow,
around the Boulevard Ring.
We’ll go to the Neskuchny Garden—
and let’s not think about
who may be waiting around the corner,
even
if they well and truly are.”
Translated from the Russian by Boris Dralyuk.