 |
Wires Poetry |
Original poems by Marina Tsvetaeva
Lyric 1
Along these singing lines that run
From pole to pole, supporting heaven
I send along to you my portion
of earthly dust
from wires
to poles. This alley sighs
the telegraphic words: I lo-o-ve
I beg. (No printed form would
Hold that word ! But wires are simpler)
Atlas himself upon these poles
lowered the racetrack
of the Gods.
Along these files
The telegraphic word: g-oo-dbye…
Do you hear it ? This last word
torn from my throat: Forg-i-ve….
Over these calm Atlantic fields
The rigging holds. And higher, higher.
All the messages fuse together
in Ariadne’s web: Ret-u-rn…
with plaintive cries of: I won’t leave…
These wires are steely guards upon
voices from Hell,
receding…far into that distance
still implored for some compassion.
Compassion ? ( but in such a chorus
can you distinguish such a noise ?
That cry, arising as death comes---
through mounds---and ditches---that last
waft of her --- a passion that persists---
Euridice’s: A-a-alas
And not—a-
Lyric 2
If I spoke to you directly ---not like this,
crushed into lines and rhymes ----
but from my whole heart , even Racine
or Shakespeare could not cope with it !
‘Everyone wept, with poison in their blood.
They wept to see a snake among the roses.’
But Phaedra had only one Hyppolitus,
and Ariadne only wept for Theseus---
while in losing you, I have lost
everything I love, I am adrift,
there is no shore, no boundary to pain---
everyone whoever lived is forfeit.
What can I hope for now? The very air
I breathe is so accustomed to you.
My own bones have grown into a prison,
lonely as Naxos --- my blood is the Styx.
Vanity ! In me—and everywhere!
To close my eyes against it has no meaning
----since there is no daylight--- and besides
the date on the calendar is lying…
and when you--- break off like this---
I am no Ariadne , no Phaedra.
Only loss !
Over which seas, in what cities
shall I look for you ? ( A blind
search for the invisible). I must
rely on wires, and weep at every pole.
18 March 1923
3
Sorting through everything, throwing out
whatever I can , I reject first of all
the semaphore, that wildest dissonance
---though a whole chorus rushes to the rescue,
with sleeves like banners, but
I throw them out ----shamelessly----
the lyric drone of wires hums above me
as if I were in traction.
The telegraph ! Could we not communicate
more quickly? The sky is still above us,
a constant dispenser of emotion,
as tangible as lips….
The heavens arch above me
with dawn on the horizon,
even at this distance I can weave
a thread to reach you.
Across the harshest years of this epoch,
over disgusting piles of tackle and gear ,
here fly my unpublished sighs,
all my raging passions---they are
simpler than a telegram (loyal, urgent
even hackneyed) they will cross
the space between us along
these wires as gutters flood in Spring.
19 March 1923
Lyric 6
At the very hour my dearest brother
passed beyond the last elm
( with a formal wave of the hand )
my tears were larger than my eyes.
In the hour when my dearest friend
sailed round the last Cape
(my whole being sighed : Come back!)
and the wave of my hand stretched
after him--- from my shoulders---
my lips—followed--entreating
but my speech lost all sound,
my hands lost their fingers.
This is the hour when we approach
with gifts--- nobler than the Tsars.
The hour when I come down the mountain.
And the mountain understands.
Wishes have gathered in a circle.
Destinies have shifted. Don’t complain!
In this hour, hands are invisible.
And souls begin to see.
In the hour when my dear guest
left me--- Look , look at us !
Our tears were larger than human
eyes ----and wider than the Atlantic.