Above is not always and never kuzovleva. It's great to be a weak woman


Citizenship: Russia

- Tanya, did you graduate from the Literary Institute or another higher educational institution?

The wonderful Faina Ranevskaya once noticed that higher education without the "lower" - trouble. I was lucky with the "lower" thanks to two people - my father, who, despite his technical warehouse, knew perfectly the history, architecture, music, painting (which is typical for the category of "former"), and a neighbor in a communal apartment, which I consider my second a mother, also from the “former”, who gave me so much kindness and love in the first ten years of my life that I still live by her light.

As for higher education, I studied at the Moscow State teacher training institute (history department). And already being a member of the Writers' Union, she graduated from the Higher Literary Courses. My relationship with the Literary Institute did not work out: at the exam in Soviet literature, I was "flunked" by a certain Pukhov because I incorrectly named the color of the cover (!) Of the book of poems by the Soviet classic Vasily Fedorov, who later frankly admitted that due to dark hair took me for a Jewess. I have never regretted not being there.

- When and where were your poems first published? Remember that day, your feelings?

My first poems were published in Komsomolskaya Pravda in the early sixties, thanks to the participation of Evgenia Samoilovna Laskina, who was in charge of the literature department at Komsomolskaya Pravda in those years. That day, from dawn, I stumbled at the newsstand, bought an armful of newspapers. Then they called from the editorial office: it turned out that they also pay money for this. I was shocked.

The first "living" poet who took part in my life was Mikhail Arkadyevich Svetlov. One of the then important poems for me "Master" is dedicated to him. Somewhere even the page of the Literaturnaya Gazeta of those years has survived, where under the heading “Masters teach ...” (it seems so) there was a photograph taken by the famous photographer Mikhail Trakhman: next to Svetlov sitting at the writing table, my silhouette looms timidly ...

- Did your parents welcome your choice? You seem to have a daughter. What specialty did she choose? If you chose poetry, how would you react?

My father wanted me to get an engineering degree. Parents' attitude towards my choice began to change after several publications and successful performances at major evenings in the Central House of Writers and in the Tchaikovsky Concert Hall.

My daughter Olga Savelyeva writes poetry, in her youth she translated young poets - her peers, was published quite a lot, was a participant in one of the last All-Union meetings of young writers (1984), but became interested in newspaper journalism, graduated from the journalism faculty of Moscow State University, worked in Komsomolskaya Pravda, Novaya newspaper ”, in other publications. She is now a production editor at Ring A. Thirteen-year-old grandson Artemy is busy with algebra, physics, programming. IN recent times, having cooled somewhat from "Harry Potter", discovered Bulgakov and Ilf and Petrov. Which I am very happy about.

From my own experience I know that you shouldn't interfere too categorically with the professional choice of the younger generations. Is that at the level of everyday advice. But they must be in demand and not annoying. After all, character is formed through trial and error too.

- In Soviet times, being a professional poet was easier (financially), right? Now, in my opinion, even a successful songwriter cannot feed himself ...

Not certainly in that way. And then it was impossible for the poet to live on only fees. Poetic books, as a rule, even among more or less successful authors came out once every three to five years ... But there was whole system part-time jobs: paid (in general, penny) performances, replies to letters in one or another edition, translations. My husband, the poet Vladimir Savelyev, having survived extreme poverty in the first year of our life together, at first took on everything: a daughter was born, and we could afford to spend no more than a ruble a day on food and other needs (this money was usually bought in “Cookery »A kilogram of buckwheat porridge and a kilogram of boiled heart or udder). I remember that a notification came for a parcel from Volodya's mother from the Volga village of Verkhnyaya Gryaznukha. We dreamed that the parcel contained fat. For the last 90 kopecks, we bought a dozen eggs, looking forward to the royal eggs. And the package contained about a hundred eggs, each of which was lovingly wrapped in a piece of newspaper ... The plot is in the spirit of O'Henry.

As a result, our "poetic" family survived thanks to translations. They gave us not only material freedom, but helped us find friends for life. We have always worked hard, but this work is exciting and grateful. Now, after a fifteen-year “dead season,” a mutual (so far fragile) interest in translating the poems of our foreign neighbors into Russian is beginning to revive. Old ties are destroyed for natural reasons, new ones are being forged almost blindly. Nevertheless, in "Ring A" we have published a selection of contemporary Romanian and Bulgarian poets. There is an agreement on the publication of young Belarusian, Slovak and Polish authors.

The new time more rigidly puts in their places both those poets who fit into the system of commercial demand and those who are outside it. But no one today, as before, expects to live on fees. As for songwriters, their royalties can range from $ 500-1000 per lyrics.

- It seems that Alexander Mezhirov said: "It is an honor to be a poet before 30, and sheer disgrace - after 30". How would you comment on these lines?

Crafty lines. How to deal with Tyutchev, Goethe, Shakespeare, and in the twentieth century - with Akhmatova, Tsvetaeva, Pasternak, Martynov, Tarkovsky ... The list goes on.

- How many collections have you published? Which one do you think is the most successful and why?

Fifteen, including Hudlite's one-volume Selected (1985). The most successful is always the one that is prepared last. I hope to publish it this year. Although, of course, I would like to consider it the penultimate out of superstition.

- Which poets of the older generation or your contemporaries are close to you?

Leonid Martynov, Boris Slutsky, David Samoilov, Arseny Tarkovsky; early Evgeny Evtushenko, Andrei Voznesensky, Bella Akhmadulina; the last poems by Robert Rozhdestvensky and Vladimir Kornilov; Rimma Kazakova, Alexander Gorodnitsky. And, of course, the songs of Bulat Okudzhava.

- Is there a memory for poetry? How many of your own and others' poems do you know by heart?

Exist. As proof - the phenomenal memory of Vladimir Savelyev - to my envy, he could read his favorite poems by heart in large quantities and without twisting the lines. My "anthology" of favorite poetry is much more modest. It undergoes rotation from time to time. In memory - "Before the Mirror" by Khodasevich, "Choice" by Gumilyov, "I asked God for an easy life" by Tkhorzhevsky, "Ballad about a smoky carriage" ("Do not part with your loved ones ...") by Alexander Kochetkov, "Swing" by Sologub, some poems by Pasternak , Akhmatov's and Tsvetaev's lines…. But what she once knew has not gone anywhere. I try to read my poems by heart.

- You are the editor-in-chief of the Ring A magazine. Who subsidizes it? Is he popular with readers? Can you trace this?

- “Ring A” was conceived as an organ of the Moscow Writers' Union. The idea of \u200b\u200bits creation was based on the fact that the "thick" magazines have somewhat receded into themselves, and in the desks of even venerable writers, good things continue to remain unclaimed. And it is difficult for young people to get into thick magazines. We did not lower the bar of professionalism, and we always tried to maintain the level of what was published. The magazine was first published with the support of the Moskovsky Rabochiy publishing house, but seven years ago, when Alexander Muzykantsky, a first-wave democrat, a former deputy of the Gorbachev Supreme Soviet, was the prefect of the Central Administrative District (CAD) of Moscow, Ring A began to be subsidized by the prefecture of the Central District of the capital, and although the prefects have changed twice since then, they still do not refuse to help us. The first issue of the magazine was published ten years ago. The authors of the magazine in different years were Bulat Okudzhava, Yuri Nagibin, Vyacheslav Kondratyev, Boris Chichibabin, Yuri Davydov, Alexander Ivanov, Robert Rozhdestvensky, Vladimir Kornilov, Boris Vasiliev, Rimma Kazakova, Leonid Zhukhovitsky, Boris Krutier, Yuri Chernichenko, Grigory Shmelev ... Many talented poets and prose writers of young and middle age, once published in "Ring A", remain our authors to this day, among them are poets Elena Isaeva, Galina Nerpina, Lev Boldov, Dmitry Vedenyapin, Dmitry Kurilov, Evgeny Lesin, prose writers Sergei Burtyak, Aleksey Ivanov, Emelyan Markov, Roman Senchin, Nikolai Ustyantsev, Margarita Sharapova, young Natalia Shcherbina ... They formed a certain circle that allowed us to create the “Ring A Club”, which monthly gathers a full audience in the Small Hall of the Central House of Writers. This is a presentation of book novelties by our authors, evenings of prose, poetry, humor, author's songs, obligatory performances by creative youth; at the beginning of the year, traditionally - a festive summing up with the presentation of several awards for best publications... I can judge the popularity of the magazine not only by oral reviews or newspaper reviews, but also by the growing influx of manuscripts, and by requests from libraries to purchase new copies.

- Is the newspaper "Moscow Literator" published today? What is your relationship with her editorial staff?

It turns out. Well, what kind of relationship can there be with a clearly chauvinist newspaper, the publication of the Moscow branch of the Writers' Union of Russia, except for the squeamish and protest, if it publishes, for example, such verses:

RETRIBUTION

With what animal Jewish fear

they chattered from the screens!

America posed by cancer

the only joy these days.

And I don't want to feel sorry for these Yankees.

They have no sympathy for others in anyone.

And I myself could, not even because of the drunkenness,

direct the plane to the White House ...

Rimma Kazakova sent a sharp remark on this matter to LG, which, however, was never published ...

Or the lines about Stalin: "The leader, born of the Cosmos, \\\\ sent down to us by the Lord, \\\\ Believed in the Orthodox way \\\\ In the new Soviet covenant ..."

What, for example, would you, Vladimir, have a relationship with such a newspaper? ..

- Whom did you support in the last Duma elections? Why do you think Yabloko and the Union of Right Forces were defeated?

I voted for the Union of Right Forces, hoping that it will nevertheless crawl over the five percent line. That did not happen. I think its leaders turned out to be "terribly far" from their voters - the Russian democratic intelligentsia, whose opinions and protection of their interests, unfortunately, were neglected, as well as dialogue with them. As a result, according to Zhvanetsky, today it turns out like this: “Having passed the way evolutionary development in a downward spiral, we returned to where we left from. True, already without money, without the best brains and without muscles ... I said: either I will live well, or my works will become immortal. And life again turned towards works ... ".

- Please tell us about the movement "Christians of Russia - in support of Israel". What is the main meaning of his activities?

First short story the question of Christian support for the people of Israel in general. The pioneers here were Protestants, who saw in the restoration of Israel the fulfillment of the prophecies about the Second Coming of the Savior. 23 years ago, they organized the "International Christian Embassy", and since then they come to the Feast of Tabernacles every year to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, to take part in a round table and a festive procession and thus express Christian love for the biblical people, which, as said in scripture, "all will be saved."

This year, five thousand Christians from 65 countries of the world came to Jerusalem, among which there were more than thirty Russians. Our pilgrimage to the Holy Land became possible thanks to the initiative of the Mikhail Cherny Charitable Foundation, a foundation formed after the terrorist attack at the Dolphinarium disco on June 1, 2001, as a result of which several dozen children of Russian Jews were killed and maimed.

It is still too early to speak of the Russian Christian movement, or a society in support of Israel, as an established and clearly structured organization. Everything is just beginning. However, as far as I know, there is a program developed within the framework of the Foundation for Social, Economic and Intellectual Programs, headed by Sergei Filatov, and such a program: "Russia - Israel: Dialogue of Two Cultures", in the implementation of which the Writers' Union of Moscow could join, and expressed this desire is the Roerich Museum.

Israel has promised moral support for this endeavor. There remains neither more nor less - to find funding, without which, even if there are enthusiasts, the work can go into the sand.

I see the meaning of this movement in the formation public opinion about the people of Israel as a selfless worker who risks their children every day to maintain peace; in categorical condemnation of terrorism, which is the main threat to civilization. Among the people of Israel, I include both Jews and Arabs, who connect the life and future of their children with a peaceful, prosperous Israel. I would also like to hope that the support of Israel by Christians will help many mass media to tell people not only about the explosions in this country, but also in a more voluminous and interested way - about the achievements of its science, culture, literature, art ...

- It seems that there is also a movement in support of Israel inside the Orthodox Church?

I only know about the personal initiatives of some Orthodox priests. But it seems to me that promotions like the one in which I took part can multiply their number.

- Is a surge of anti-Semitism possible in Russia?

Who will guarantee that there is no? This ugliness manifests itself regardless of education, or the standard of living, or citizenship, or religion, or state system... It is often the subject of all sorts of speculations, especially political ones. And always directed by someone. Communicating with his volunteers, I, a Russian, feel uncomfortable and chilly. I consider myself a cosmopolitan, despite the generic meta of Russia in my heart and the fact that this word was grossly compromised in our country in the late forties. For some reason, the definition of "internationalist" does not find such consonance in me.

By the way, in the first three issues of "Ring A" we repeated the questionnaire compiled at the beginning of the First World War by Leonid Andreev, Maxim Gorky and Fyodor Sologub (then this questionnaire was in the secret police after a search in the magazine "Fatherland") - about the reasons for the emergence of anti-Semitism in Russia , about its influence on different aspects of Russian life, about the role of Jews in art, science, social and cultural life of the country, about possible measures to counteract this shameful phenomenon. Several dozen well-known writers answered the questionnaire: Mikhail Roshchin, Valentin Erashov, Grigory Pomerants, Bulat Okudzhava, Leonid Likhodeev, Vladimir Vishnevsky, Vasil Bykov, Valentin Oskotsky, Alexander Ivanov, and many others.

- In general, does today's Russian life dispose to poetry? Or - in the most cruel times, poetry lived ...

It is not good to oppose life and poetry. Time and poetry. It is not life or time that disposes or does not dispose to poetry, but poetry fills time and life with its rhythms - starting from antiquity, from the first lullabies and the first battle songs ... Poems burst into life often not due to external conditions, but in spite of them. They are dictated by love, without which life has no continuation.

- Have you been to America? Your impressions of the country and our emigrants ...

No, I haven't. But to say that I have no idea of \u200b\u200bAmerican life at all would be untrue. Still, there is some information ... It's probably funny, but my former compatriots (emigrants in the first generation) seem to me unprotected in America. I'm afraid for all of you guys. And I can't protect you! Most importantly, you don’t need it. I do not exclude that you are experiencing something similar to people like me. Maybe, while we are alive, we will always worry about each other ...

Tatyana Kuzovleva can rightfully be called a wonderful Russian poetess. How many people have read her poems and how many thanks to them have become thinner, better, kinder!

The author of many books and publications, Tatiana Kuzovleva belongs to that legendary literary generation, which we used to call the "sixties". Sometimes it is believed that they write brightly, but too outwardly, more carried away by social topics than global problems being. A selection of poems by Tatyana Kuzovleva refutes this notion. And this is what she herself says:

“The paths of our souls are inscrutable - in dreams and in reality, on this or that side of being, in this or that guise. We are open and available to each other outside of any shell; we are a single cosmic ocean, the ebb and flow of which is subordinated to the intuition of recognition: "near - distant", "mine - alien", "from you - to you ..."

The district buzzes sleeplessly

road,

Train by train are carried away

away,

And the star looks

detached and strictly

From the cosmic night to

summer night.

And the summer night is short and

sinless

A little west will go out -

will light up the east,

The doubt will subside a little -

and hope will flash

That the world doesn't end in a network

roads.

We are brothers and sisters with foliage, with flowers,

With a grain of sand (there are no trifles on Earth!),

With that bird that will shout to me, flying

Untranslatable lines of poetry.

Probably different genes roam in us,

Then we strive for a different destiny.

One day you will lay down a legend about a bird,

And the bird will sing a legend about you.

You are forever imprinted in the memory of trees

Your step is magnetized in the earth cassette

Flying and melting in the blue distance

Do not think that your path was inert:

Hurry - wrong - strive - disappeared.

Spirit energy

Will remain immortal

In the immortal deep ocean of heaven.

And in the distant century, shining from the firmament,

The brighter you will flare up one day in the darkness,

The more love you have accumulated over the years

Behind short years their own on Earth.

I have not seen the stars more abundantly

Than midnight south in

look.

There is a drawing of constellations so

simple,

As if taken from a drawing room

notebooks.

But what clue does

The secrets of the one that will not be revealed

wants,

This lunar clarity of heights

That is punctured by the multitude

points!

And what traces are forgotten

And what masks are discarded

On the way to the North Star

On the way to crimson Mars!

Silence. And the soul weakens

Speaking of the stars disassembled from afar.

And watching us, not breathing,

Someone's life is a cold eye.

And afraid to tease this darkness

Curiosity that seems to be hidden

Only closer to your shoulder

I will snuggle, waiting for protection.

And I will not betray the sound of words

That guess that sunk in my heart.

The roar of the sea and the rustle of the winds -

I heard nothing more.

The last ray

Illuminating menacing and ominous

The contours of the swirling clouds

The last, prophetic, reaches for the Earth,

A ray going across the wave.

Reaches close to my pupils

A ray in which there has been no warmth for a long time.

And then I enter another life

I, that was forever mortal.

I fly towards that ray

Not believing in heaven, despising hell.

Marked with the blackness of vision

A motionless, blinded look.

Friendship and loneliness lights.

And other souls fly with me

Likewise incorporeal and light.

There is no resentment or forgiveness in them,

No tears, no anger, no love

There is not even a longing to return.

I will not return, no matter how much you call.

The beam will go out, disappearing fractionally,

On the water will leave, trembling slightly.

And languishing, he will open his ribs with a sigh

The soul has acquired flesh again.

Again she now, as before,

Know worries and listen to speeches.

Only the memory of the recent will

She will not be given rest at night.

I will not defile and will not break

Everything that is hidden in us during the day.

But where our souls soar

When bodies are overwhelmed by sleep?

Don't say words to me. Do not.

My daytime hearing will not understand them.

But our souls were near

They were carried away by one flight.

And everything was like reality.

Below, bonfires were being burned below us.

And more distant and stricter

We looked at the life of the Earth.

And after many hasty days

For me this dream is both alive and new.

Looking in your eyes with hope

I seek, touching my gaze with my gaze:

You couldn't forget it

After all, our souls were near

Like they could never be.

So, according to the picture given by you,

Where the heat from the luminary radiates in circles

Where copper-green rocks rise

Where even the road is tired of the heat, -

So, according to the picture you gave

Delirious, renouncing reality from now on.

And I can see clearly from under my palm

A tired wanderer in a shabby tunic.

Which truth is he looking for?

And who is he loved? And to whom is it hated?

His step is light. He keeps straight.

The road is cut off by a white frame.

And indeed, beyond this line, finally

The sage will find the cherished truth.

Then, putting on reality right,

I will part with this bloody sun,

I stare out the window - at houses, at random,

And my eyes will be blind for a long time.

And the ear will be full of rustling sand.

The road slides along the ground through the ages.

He will put on asphalt, become a street,

But its essence will no longer deceive me:

I know that the road is torn to the truth.

If I could walk on it just a little bit,

even a little,

Reduce your small path to infinity.

At least step behind the white frame.

Not in the quiet revelations of the lyre,

Not in the rigid logic of minds,

Not in the dusty volumes

About the secrets of the creation of the world

You will not find clear words.

And only in the hermitic more often,

Where light is scattered by crowns

Where there is no shadow behind

Suddenly you come across a flying one

To a tangible answer.

And you will shudder: it is unusually simple,

He will overturn the ladles of the stars,

And life will break out in the wilderness,

And the secret of the world

Will become a mystery

Your soul.

Fearing discord with earthly harmony

And yet taking risks in the night

I can hear the eyes beating as they meet -

Until small sparks hurt the space.

I am the one that rushes silently into the sky,

You are the one that falls like a stone to the Earth.

Sentenced to meet so ridiculous

Neither fire nor darkness can hinder us.

Do not etch out mutual attraction

Interpenetrating worlds:

I am your stars with a cold movement,

You are the searing heat of my earthly winds.

And where it is given to us, breaking, merge,

Where it is so easy to pass any firmament, -

There is no border at all

Meanwhile, what is called "life" here and

I liked many of her poems.

Right now, as I leave them here!

BORN IN RUSSIA

Harry Bareru

The constellation of Sagittarius is silvery in the midnight window.
And the year is coming to an end, and the time for the results has come.
To be born in Russia and live life in it to the end,
And not to get lost in its snow is a lot.

Born in Russia, where the East merged with the West,
Where conscience and power never find agreement
Where life is valued no more than a sip of vodka,
Where everything that is broken is for some reason attributed to happiness ...

And yet there is a mysterious junction of our destinies
And the fear that without us this sky will ever collapse.
And yet this, in a Pushkin's way, language,
And yet these - in the night - gatherings in the kitchens.

And shared memory.
And this is called fate.
In it, the main lights, whatever it was, we did not extinguish.
There is labor and love in it.
In it, rich and difficult,
He gets a special sense of being born in Russia.

Do good - There is no greater joy!
Don't think about yourself, hurry -
Not for fame or celebration
And at the behest of the soul.

When you boil, humiliated by misfortune,
You are from powerlessness and shame
Don't let the hurt soul
Momentary judgment.

Wait! Chill! Believe - really
Everything will fall into place.
You are strong. The strong are not vindictive
The weapon of the strong is kindness.

How we rush them first
Then we hasten to renounce them,
And we are afraid of the big numbers,
So as not to accidentally burn yourself.

But there is one simple law
He rejects the winter cold:
The one who is loved is protected
And whoever is needed is young.

Where does all this come from among our people,
How it developed, this strange series:
Live in slavery, talking about freedom,
Strive forward and slide backward.

Where does it all come from:
Spirit heights
Where the last line is visible.
And this cursed devastation
In which the country is always toiling.

Where does it come from:
With meticulous zeal
Drink, drowning the reproach of conscience,
Call the future
Longing for the past
Do not see the real point-blank

And to pass on the ground as temporary workers,
Not noticing how the earth hums
And hope for "maybe" for centuries,
And lie to yourself: "in the name ... for the sake of ... for ..."

But suddenly to see the light above the disastrous ditches,
And be horrified, cursing the power,
And save the world with beautiful words,
And again into hibernation proudly fall.

Don't run - you say - don't run! ..
I'm not running - it's just that the air is turbid
The circles just got shorter
On which we circle again.

Don't run, you say, don't rush!
I'm not in a hurry - it's not a matter of haste.
It's just, out of touch,
The body rushes after her.

Don't run. Do not rush. Wait a minute…
I try not to resist.
And will not stand in front of me, -
There will be time for you to catch your breath.

In shabby clothes, with dark wallets,
With the haze of cataracts and glaucoma
With edematous, dry, gray-yellow,
With shortness of breath, with a small step, almost crawling.

Smiling. Responsive. No harm.
Touchy. Grumpy. Day after day.
To retire, what a poverty line.
Before the line, where not a soul is around.

Worn out. Used. Squeezed out.
Humiliated. Forgotten. Not needed.
They are ashamed of the past of their country.
For their own troubles - forgiven.

Fallen foliage is mixed with the ground.
All over again. Continuity. Kinship.
Great and bitter and terrible
The history of my people.

And it's not about trouble at all, -
But occasionally, so as not to slouch,
You need to live Nowhere,
and go anywhere down the street.

And to realize that you are Nobody,
And your path will never end
And don't button your coat
And do everything as you want.

But always see the difference
Colluding with Nature,
Between Nowhere and Nowhere -
As between captivity and freedom.

OLD LOCK

Wait! Why go where, multiplying fear,
The squeak of a bat is piercingly sad.
After all, the past has long turned to dust here,
Only the silhouette of love is imprinted into the depths of the ruins.

Look, here is the ghost alive of the one who was attracted
A hundred years ago here with an unquenchable passion,
Half-open lips who kissed a break
And who threw aces in four suits on the table.

You see he came. Look, his hand
Touches the green cloth lovingly.
And he hurries to where the silks rustle,
Where it is cramped for two and breathing unevenly.

And, illuminating the vault, the disc of the Moon shines.
And the ghost between the ruins, as if in the arena.
Stop! Leave him his whim.
And spare him - don't touch someone else's Time!

In memory of Bella Akhmadulina

To others, oil on the heart is thunderous applause.
To others - weaving words in silence ...
But how can poetry remain without a voice,
Of the silver voice of heaven?

Without - a piece of ice that scratched his throat.
Without - the body straightened into a string.
How solemn and bitter he sounded -
I cannot compare a single voice with him.

There was defenselessness and courage in him,
And I cry, probably because,
What - here are the verses. Paper guards them.
But a voice, a voice! - do not return it.

***
Now dried clover, now nettles,
That is an ear of broken oats,
That in the voice of a hoarse willow,
Having not lost faith in miracles, -

Autumn writes to me. Lightweight envelopes
They lay down in the morning at my door.
The kisses of the wind darken on them,
The smells of animals walk on them.

Squirrel villi clung to them,
Flower seeds are belated fluff.
I read them quickly, without hesitation,
Without moving your lips or out loud -

This is how they accept letters from loved ones
So they press their foreheads hot to them,
Simple word order unique
Sounding with the voice of the family.

So the fallen leaf still lives and breathes.
So the lines are deafening in silence ...
... You ask who is writing letters to me.
You write to me. And autumn writes to me.

Here existence is connected by blood
Here, crowding the coast with a roar,
Heavy wet logs
Carries out on the shoal by the river.

Here the cry of tea, like a razor,
Above the dark wave is brought.
Here the wind is a dull prayer
A dream accompanies the tree.

Here the owls are screaming wildly.
Here the traveler is held captive by fear.
And here I probably first
Someday I will begin my path.

I will throne raspberries with a bear,
I will creep like a fox in the dark.
I will freeze at a silent trot
And knock the wool out of the ridge.

And I will direct my sight with hearing
Where you can't go.
And I will leave only two feelings
From the multitude: hunger and passion.

Tatiana Kuzovleva photography

The wonderful Faina Ranevskaya once noticed that higher education without “lower” is a disaster. I was lucky with the "lower" thanks to two people - my father, who, despite his technical warehouse, knew perfectly the history, architecture, music, painting (which is typical for the category of "former"), and a neighbor in a communal apartment, which I consider my second a mother, also from the “former”, who gave me so much kindness and love in the first ten years of my life that I still live by her light.

As for higher education, I studied at the Moscow State Pedagogical Institute (History Department). And already being a member of the Writers' Union, she graduated from the Higher Literary Courses. My relationship with the Literary Institute did not work out: at the exam in Soviet literature, I was "flunked" by a certain Pukhov because I incorrectly named the color of the cover (!) Of the book of poems by the Soviet classic Vasily Fedorov, who later frankly admitted that due to dark hair took me for a Jewess. I have never regretted not being there.

- When and where were your poems first published? Remember that day, your feelings?

My first poems were published in Komsomolskaya Pravda in the early sixties, thanks to the participation of Evgenia Samoilovna Laskina, who was in charge of the literature department at Komsomolskaya Pravda in those years. That day, from dawn, I stumbled at the newsstand, bought an armful of newspapers. Then they called from the editorial office: it turned out that they also pay money for this. I was shocked.

The first "living" poet who took part in my life was Mikhail Arkadyevich Svetlov. One of the then important poems for me "Master" is dedicated to him. Somewhere even the page of the Literaturnaya Gazeta of those years has survived, where under the heading “Masters teach ...” (it seems so) there was a photograph taken by the famous photographer Mikhail Trakhman: next to Svetlov sitting at the writing table, my silhouette looms timidly ...

- Did your parents welcome your choice? You seem to have a daughter. What specialty did she choose? If you chose poetry, how would you react?

My father wanted me to get an engineering degree. Parents' attitude towards my choice began to change after several publications and successful performances at major evenings in the Central House of Writers and in the Tchaikovsky Concert Hall.

Best of the day

My daughter Olga Savelyeva writes poetry, in her youth she translated young poets - her peers, published quite a lot, was a participant in one of the last All-Union meetings of young writers (1984), but became interested in newspaper journalism, graduated from the journalism faculty of Moscow State University, worked in Komsomolskaya Pravda, Novaya newspaper ”, in other publications. She is now a production editor at Ring A. Thirteen-year-old grandson Artemy is busy with algebra, physics, programming. Recently, having cooled down a little from "Harry Potter", I discovered Bulgakov and Ilf and Petrov. Which I am very happy about.

From my own experience I know that you shouldn't interfere too categorically with the professional choice of the younger generations. Is that at the level of everyday advice. But they must be in demand and not annoying. After all, character is formed through trial and error too.

- In Soviet times, being a professional poet was easier (financially), right? Now, in my opinion, even a successful songwriter cannot feed himself ...

Not certainly in that way. And then it was impossible for the poet to live on only fees. Poetry books, as a rule, even from more or less successful authors came out once every three to five years ... But there was a whole system of part-time jobs: paid (in general, penny) speeches, replies to letters in one or another edition, translations. My husband, the poet Vladimir Savelyev, having survived extreme poverty in the first year of our life together, at first took on everything: a daughter was born, and we could afford to spend no more than a ruble per day on food and other needs (this money was usually bought in “Cookery »A kilogram of buckwheat porridge and a kilogram of boiled heart or udder). I remember that a notice came for a parcel from Volodya's mother from the Volga village of Verkhnyaya Gryaznukha. We dreamed that there was bacon in the package. For the last 90 kopecks, we bought a dozen eggs, looking forward to the royal eggs. And the package contained about a hundred eggs, each of which was lovingly wrapped in a piece of newspaper ... The plot is in the spirit of O'Henry.

As a result, our "poetic" family survived thanks to translations. They gave us not only material freedom, but helped us find friends for life. We have always worked hard, but this work is exciting and grateful. Now, after a fifteen-year “dead season,” a mutual (so far fragile) interest in translating the poems of our foreign neighbors into Russian is beginning to revive. Old ties are destroyed for natural reasons, new ones are being forged almost blindly. Nevertheless, in "Ring A" we have published a selection of contemporary Romanian and Bulgarian poets. There is an agreement on the publication of young Belarusian, Slovak and Polish authors.

The new time more rigidly puts in their places both those poets who fit into the system of commercial demand and those who are outside it. But no one today, as before, expects to live on fees. As for songwriters, their royalties can range from $ 500-1000 per lyrics.

- It seems that Alexander Mezhirov said: "It is an honor to be a poet before 30, and sheer disgrace - after 30". How would you comment on these lines?

Crafty lines. How to deal with Tyutchev, Goethe, Shakespeare, and in the twentieth century - with Akhmatova, Tsvetaeva, Pasternak, Martynov, Tarkovsky ... The list goes on.

- How many collections have you published? Which one do you think is the most successful and why?

Fifteen, including Hudlite's one-volume Selected (1985). The most successful is always the one that is prepared last. I hope to publish it this year. Although, of course, I would like to consider it the penultimate out of superstition.

- Which poets of the older generation or your contemporaries are close to you?

Leonid Martynov, Boris Slutsky, David Samoilov, Arseny Tarkovsky; early Evgeny Evtushenko, Andrei Voznesensky, Bella Akhmadulina; the last poems by Robert Rozhdestvensky and Vladimir Kornilov; Rimma Kazakova, Alexander Gorodnitsky. And, of course, the songs of Bulat Okudzhava.

- Is there a memory for poetry? How many of your own and others' poems do you know by heart?

Exist. As proof - the phenomenal memory of Vladimir Savelyev - to my envy, he could read his favorite poems by heart in large quantities and without twisting the lines. My "anthology" of favorite poetry is much more modest. It undergoes rotation from time to time. In memory - "Before the Mirror" by Khodasevich, "Choice" by Gumilyov, "I asked God for an easy life" by Tkhorzhevsky, "Ballad about a smoky carriage" ("Do not part with your loved ones ...") by Alexander Kochetkov, "Swing" by Sologub, some poems by Pasternak , Akhmatov's and Tsvetaev's lines…. But what she once knew has not gone anywhere. I try to read my poems by heart.

- You are the editor-in-chief of the Ring A magazine. Who subsidizes it? Is he popular with readers? Can you trace this?

- “Ring A” was conceived as an organ of the Moscow Writers' Union. The idea of \u200b\u200bits creation was based on the fact that the "thick" magazines have somewhat receded into themselves, and in the desks of even venerable writers, good things continue to remain unclaimed. And it is difficult for young people to get into thick magazines. We did not lower the bar of professionalism, and we always tried to maintain the level of what was published. The magazine was first published with the support of the Moskovsky Rabochiy publishing house, but seven years ago, when Alexander Muzykantsky, a first-wave democrat, a former deputy of the Gorbachev Supreme Soviet, was the prefect of the Central Administrative District (CAD) of Moscow, Ring A began to be subsidized by the prefecture of the Central District of the capital, and although the prefects have changed twice since then, they still do not refuse to help us. The first issue of the magazine was published ten years ago. The authors of the magazine in different years were Bulat Okudzhava, Yuri Nagibin, Vyacheslav Kondratyev, Boris Chichibabin, Yuri Davydov, Alexander Ivanov, Robert Rozhdestvensky, Vladimir Kornilov, Boris Vasiliev, Rimma Kazakova, Leonid Zhukhovitsky, Boris Krutier, Yuri Chernichenko, Grigory Shmelev ... Many talented poets and prose writers of young and middle age, once published in "Ring A", remain to this day our authors, among them are poets Elena Isaeva, Galina Nerpina, Lev Boldov, Dmitry Vedenyapin, Dmitry Kurilov, Evgeny Lesin, prose writers Sergei Burtyak, Aleksey Ivanov, Emelyan Markov, Roman Senchin, Nikolai Ustyantsev, Margarita Sharapova, young Natalia Shcherbina ... They formed a certain circle that allowed us to create the “Ring A Club”, which monthly gathers a full audience in the Small Hall of the Central House of Writers. This is a presentation of book novelties of our authors, evenings of prose, poetry, humor, author's songs, obligatory performances by creative youth; at the beginning of the year traditionally - a festive summing up with the presentation of several prizes for the best publications. I can judge the popularity of the magazine not only by oral reviews or newspaper reviews, but also by the growing influx of manuscripts, and by requests from libraries to purchase new copies.

- Is the newspaper "Moscow Literator" published today? What is your relationship with her editorial staff?

It turns out. Well, what kind of relationship can there be with a clearly chauvinist newspaper, the publication of the Moscow branch of the Writers' Union of Russia, except for the squeamish and protest, if it publishes, for example, such verses:

RETRIBUTION

With what animal Jewish fear

they chattered from the screens!

America posed by cancer

the only joy these days.

And I don't want to feel sorry for these Yankees.

They have no sympathy for others in anyone.

And I myself could, not even because of the drunkenness,

direct the plane to the White House ...

Rimma Kazakova sent a sharp remark on this matter to LG, which, however, was never published ...

Or the lines about Stalin: "The leader, born of the Cosmos, \\\\ sent down to us by the Lord, \\\\ Believed in the Orthodox way \\\\ In the new Soviet covenant ..."

What, for example, would you, Vladimir, have a relationship with such a newspaper? ..

- Whom did you support in the last Duma elections? Why do you think Yabloko and the Union of Right Forces were defeated?

I voted for the Union of Right Forces, hoping that it will nevertheless crawl over the five percent line. That did not happen. I think its leaders turned out to be "terribly far" from their voters - the Russian democratic intelligentsia, whose opinions and protection of their interests, unfortunately, were neglected, as well as dialogue with them. As a result, according to Zhvanetsky, today it turns out like this: “Having passed the path of evolutionary development in a downward spiral, we returned to where we came from. True, already without money, without the best brains and without muscles ... I said: either I will live well, or my works will become immortal. And life again turned towards works ... ".

- Please tell us about the movement "Christians of Russia - in support of Israel". What is the main meaning of his activities?

First, a brief history of the issue of Christian support for the people of Israel in general. The pioneers here were Protestants, who saw in the restoration of Israel the fulfillment of the prophecies about the Second Coming of the Savior. 23 years ago, they organized the "International Christian Embassy", and since then they come to the Feast of Tabernacles every year to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, to take part in a round table and a festive procession and thus express Christian love for the biblical people, which, as said in scripture, "all will be saved."

This year, five thousand Christians from 65 countries of the world came to Jerusalem, among which there were more than thirty Russians. Our pilgrimage to the Holy Land became possible thanks to the initiative of the Mikhail Cherny Charitable Foundation, a foundation formed after the terrorist attack at the Dolphinarium disco on June 1, 2001, as a result of which several dozen children of Russian Jews were killed and maimed.

It is still too early to speak of the Russian Christian movement, or a society in support of Israel, as an established and clearly structured organization. Everything is just beginning. However, as far as I know, there is a program developed within the framework of the Foundation for Social, Economic and Intellectual Programs, headed by Sergei Filatov, and such a program: "Russia - Israel: Dialogue of Two Cultures", in the implementation of which the Writers' Union of Moscow could join, and expressed this desire is the Roerich Museum.

Israel has promised moral support for this endeavor. There remains neither more nor less - to find funding, without which, even if there are enthusiasts, the work can go into the sand.

I see the meaning of such a movement in shaping public opinion about the people of Israel as a selfless worker who risks their children every day in the name of maintaining peace; in categorical condemnation of terrorism, which is the main threat to civilization. Among the people of Israel, I include both Jews and Arabs, who connect the life and future of their children with a peaceful, prosperous Israel. I would also like to hope that the support of Israel by Christians will help many mass media to tell people not only about the explosions in this country, but also in a more voluminous and interested way - about the achievements of its science, culture, literature, art ...

- It seems that there is also a movement in support of Israel inside the Orthodox Church?

I only know about the personal initiatives of some Orthodox priests. But it seems to me that promotions like the one in which I took part can multiply their number.

- Is a surge of anti-Semitism possible in Russia?

Who will guarantee that there is no? This ugliness manifests itself regardless of education, or the standard of living, or citizenship, or religion, or the state system. It is often the subject of all sorts of speculations, especially political ones. And always directed by someone. Communicating with his volunteers, I, a Russian, feel uncomfortable and chilly. I consider myself a cosmopolitan, despite the generic meta of Russia in my heart and the fact that this word was grossly compromised in our country in the late forties. For some reason, the definition of "internationalist" does not find such consonance in me.

By the way, in the first three issues of "Ring A" we repeated the questionnaire compiled at the beginning of the First World War by Leonid Andreev, Maxim Gorky and Fyodor Sologub (then this questionnaire was in the secret police after a search in the magazine "Fatherland") - about the reasons for the emergence of anti-Semitism in Russia , about its influence on different aspects of Russian life, about the role of Jews in art, science, social and cultural life of the country, about possible measures to counteract this shameful phenomenon. Several dozen well-known writers answered the questionnaire: Mikhail Roshchin, Valentin Erashov, Grigory Pomerants, Bulat Okudzhava, Leonid Likhodeev, Vladimir Vishnevsky, Vasil Bykov, Valentin Oskotsky, Alexander Ivanov, and many others.

- In general, does today's Russian life dispose to poetry? Or - in the most cruel times, poetry lived ...

Life and poetry cannot be opposed. Time and poetry. It is not life or time that disposes or does not dispose to poetry, but poetry fills time and life with its rhythms - starting from antiquity, from the first lullabies and the first battle songs ... Poems burst into life often not due to external conditions, but in spite of them. They are dictated by love, without which life has no continuation.

- Have you been to America? Your impressions of the country and our emigrants ...

No, I haven't. But to say that I have no idea of \u200b\u200bAmerican life at all would be untrue. Still, there is some information ... It's probably funny, but my former compatriots (emigrants in the first generation) seem to me unprotected in America. I'm afraid for all of you guys. And I can't protect you! Most importantly, you don’t need it. I do not exclude that you are experiencing something similar to people like me. Maybe, while we are alive, we will always worry about each other ...

In real time.
MAG 12.09.2006 05:24:17

I live in Israel. The history of my people is described in the Bible, Tanach and in
countless works, articles, etc. And each time a living word warms the heart, the word of a woman poet, mother, wife, grandmother. How many faces a person is, especially if his heart is filled with love for GOD.

* * *

And you are of the Silver Age
Such different singers
Whose lines are a silver echo
Through border columns

Flew, scattering through the hearts.
And it was so breathtaking
And they exclaimed: "Khodasevich!"
"Ivanov!" - fizzled out aloud.

What and how did you live,
What pains, troubles, were
Fitted in your mirrors?
And homeland or foreign land -
Who beat more precisely from around the corner?
You are all along the icy path
Now gone beyond the horizon -
Impassive Block,
Crazy White
And Balmont waving his hat.

And I draw with concentration
An invisible bridge over Time
Among the great loneliness
To the night shine of your stars

I
A DIARY

* * *

We live without separating our hands
Blessing the pain of an embrace:
A protected circle is outlined
Even before the sacrament of conception.

We feel every sound in it,
Names and dates are sacred
And the closer this circle,
The more intolerable the loss.

And therefore on the way, at home,
On dashing days, on night holidays
I won't give you to anyone -
Earth circle partners.

* * *

It all started brightly.
Everything was absorbed quickly.
Heart was beating hot
Throwing out sparks

Falling in love and rejoicing
Hearing rhymes everywhere
I studied blindly
Walk along the edge of the roof.

Trembling and dying,
And from fearless crying,
But still understanding
I can't do otherwise.

What to me - recklessly
Over the abyss - higher and higher.

... I am still blind
I walk along the edge of the roof.

SNOWFLAKE

Burning, melting, dying
A butterfly striving for fire
Burning out of love and tenderness,
You will fall into my palm.

Oh eight-pointed, carved,
Fragile, almost unearthly
Stepdaughter permafrost, -
How to escape from the pack you decided
Weightless as you were spinning
How did you get off the top?

How much rain to snow
You wandered, my joy,
A drop, a crystalline lens, a soul?
How was it possible in the eternal rebirth
You save your heart from decay
Breathing thin air?

Where else between this and this light,
Taking off from the ground in summer
And flying to the ground in winter
Suddenly converge at the point of the original
Two paths dissimilar and random
Two flying opposite - yours and mine:

A bright flash, unbearable pain
The parting will pierce my chest.
... I'm afraid to move my hand,
In order not to frighten this closeness.

THUNDERSTORM IN BRATISLAVA

Listen: under the roof of the attic
The light of the lamp went shaking
And the downpour danced with relish,
Knocking on the tin with his heel.

In some kind of mad ecstasy
The wind blew the midnight mist,
And the souls of the princes of Esterhazy
They murmured, crowded in the corner.

I confused the century. Alone
I was a stranger in the temple,
And a broken umbrella is lopsided
He bristled up next to me.

He could not contain this strength,
Sullenly flawed melting, -
The same as me - one-winged,
And the extra one is the same as me.

* * *

Olga Zabotkina

From the gloom of a neglected apartment
Through mirrors, through walls, through curtains
It comes through - a ghost, an image, a spirit
That women are beauties, dancers,
Which parterres and galleries
They clapped, sparing no hands.

In ballet style, in a slightly sly look,
Whether in Spanish or in a gypsy outfit -
All over the Petersburg woman. And in everything -
Sometimes restrained, sometimes hot-tempered, sometimes absurd.
And secretly the blood of Baron Benckendorff
Wandering in it and burning with its fire.

Heiress of exquisite portraits,
Children's home, blockade girl, ballet
Deprived of warmth, alone as a finger
She only sought protection in love.
Her men were famous
And everyone for her was - a heavy cross.

Or maybe there was a spring in that,
That a loving man was cruel to her
Then that he did not understand one thing
And he was angry with the woman in vain:
It so happens that beauty is passionless
And not everyone can wake up.

* * *

In the twilight of the morning on the highway near Moscow
Where the drifts are frozen, blue and hunchback,
Waiting, freezing, when on my lane
A sleepy bus will go up the hill slowly.

Here he appears, dull eyes stare,
He will sigh noisily and slow down his run out of habit.
His brakes will stop near me.
Clinking and coughing, he hurries to the train.

I will warm up among sheepskin coats and fur coats,
I breathe smoke and garlic until I feel sick.
The ears will fill the tired motor noise,
Someone will argue monotonously with the conductor.

The eternal book will be read to the holes.
These twilight hardly washed away the main thing in her:
As the morning world is not real and ghostly,
How unreal and ghostly you are in this world.

Fragile is the ice on which my life is again
In the morning it is easy to look at yours ...
I once called love pity.
Tenderness is necessary.

WIND OVER HUDZONE

Why do you randomly call
A line rushed towards it?
Here the wind hums over the Hudson
Clouds chasing through the water.
That's how he will chase you,
Breaking down suddenly to the whistle,
Pick up, spin, drop,
Forget it like a dried leaf.
Come back! Your romance with him will not last forever
You will never be together.
He was married only with the wanderings
And it is torn to who knows where.
You can't pin it to paper,
The wind has a special reason.
You're just a fragile rhyme
Hit the lead Hudson.

* * *

On the eve of summer, in anticipation of lilacs,
In the high twilight, where shadows die silently,
Where the beast is ready to brush away the remnants of laziness
Rhythmic blows of the tail;

Where a hungry hunting spirit sleeps in the thickets,
Where are rivers whirlpools so dangerous?
And fractional cuckoo hiccups
Counts down the years for a reason, -

There the air exfoliates above the trees,
The faces are getting sharper there
All those who are so painfully loved.

They need very little from us:

Mention of name when
The first star rises in the sky.

And, touching the candles with a living flame,
Feel that there are no boundaries between us.

* * *

The winds are returning to square one,
And a track flies from east to west
And without pauses - to the east, in a circle.
Oh, how the rings coiled tightly!

* * *

Between canyons, quarries, loose slopes,
Where, scratching the bottom, the wind drives the sand,
Where dwellings hung like nests on the steep slopes,
Where the voice of a mysterious bird rings;

Where the sky is strung on the spire of the cypress,
Where the birch drops foliage by December
Where the book of flower whims is flipping
With petal babbling lung "I love" -

There mine, not accustomed to eternal summer,
Will revive, warm up, the soul trembles,
This path, this time and this planet
In the trinity, take in recklessly in a hurry.

I seem to forget the cold nights
Tenderness of snow and blizzard infusion of witchcraft,
But it will be too short and strong
Leash.
He is always behind me.

Therefore, I rush between those who are loved,
Where two sushi were brought together by one ocean ...

In our life, everything is probably compatible.
But everyone has their own time and place.
Stone canyon,
Los Angeles

* * *

In memory of Rimma Kazakova

All my life - like a razor's edge.
Pulling your elbows back,
I broke the usual rhythms
I caught the movement of the line.

And in a passionate battle with lies
Guessing her a mile away,
One, no insurance, no lanyard
I was looking for my height.

And his life is unstoppable
Burned until it burned.
She was loved, unloved.
But the main thing was it was.

But the main thing is that it hasn't changed
Neither essence nor purpose.
And she forgave everyone who offended.
And she handed everything out of things.

And there, at the holy threshold,
Freed from the flesh
"Is it a sin?" - having heard from God,
He will obediently answer: "Sinful."

And before he comes back again
Others will master the ways.
And we still have to
All this to go through one day.

And we also have a word and a look
Search the earth for her trace
And see and feel near
Living and unfading light.

DO NOT START THE FIRE ...

Tamara Zhirmunskaya

1

... In a coat open on the street
You go, caught up in May,
And only at the neck there is a button
Squeezes the opening of the lungs.

The godchildren of a short thaw
We lived with winged lines, -
Lovers, almost the same age,
Cohesive by the sixties.

There again - spring thaw,
Around it is sunny, then gloomy,
There you walk down the street again
Slightly waving her purse, -

Carry among the dialect of Moscow
Face drawing romantic,
As from the canvas of Borovikovsky
Descended into our cosmic age.

2

Stingy smiles, meetings less often,
But still in the secret hour
We are the same in the circle of our peers
And we have the same voices.

We drink in slow sips
For the fact that again we are not apart,
For the best that happened to us
For a secret that did not come true.

And toasts, lines, views shine,
And laughter explodes, ringing ...

Just don't light the fire.
No need to light a fire.

* * *

In memory of Bella Akhmadulina

To others, oil on the heart is thunderous applause.
To others - weaving words in silence. ...
But how can poetry remain without a voice,
Of the silver voice of heaven?

Without - a piece of ice that scratched the throat ...
Without - the body straightened into a string ...
How solemn and bitter he sounded -
I cannot compare a single voice with him.

There was defenselessness and courage in him,
And I cry, probably because,
What - here are the verses. Paper guards them.
But a voice, a voice! - do not return it.

* * *

And the full moon
And the thin cry of a coyote
And torn off the chain at the turn
From smells a raging dog

And the darkness that swallowed up the bush near the house,
And the light in the window, where your shadow is frozen,
And escaped, as from quarantine,
Owls suddenly hooted question -

Everything that has been no-man's
That didn't seem to matter
Suddenly it acquired a clue, meaning, glow:
The world is only our flesh and blood.

And we are his immortality and movement,
Its core, in which exceptions
Unthinkable.
There is one love for all.
Stone canyon,
Los Angeles

* * *

The energy of love and the power of light -
The world order is initially simple.
Not all questions require an answer.
Sometimes it is more important that the question was asked.

* * *

It turns out that all our life we \u200b\u200bhave been waiting for murder
that the consequence is just a form of expectation,
and that the criminal is not a criminal at all,
So what...
Joseph Brodsky. Dedicated to Yalta

… And nobody knows whose fault it was.
Just the air of murder in the front door spent the night.
The wave just knocked loudly against the breakwater,
A piercing shriek just tore the gull throat.

However, maybe this is a woman's despair
For the killed, or the last moan of passion.
Everything came together in one: Yalta. Scene. Temptation. Dead end.
And the bloody peony trembles in the hands of passion.

Well, where there is temptation and passion, there fate is the target.
There accidentally death hits the barrel.
And what difference does it make if it's night or day
If life remains, but passion is gone.

Everything is there by chance: the chess player, the captain, She.
Captain's son with parabellum. Did not want…
For three men, one wine falls,
Everyone is on his own.
But one for three sight.
Who among us does not latently wait for his death?
Who goes home, not avoiding the gateway?
And nobody knows whose bullet will hit him
And that there was always a connection between him and the killer.

And behind all the words so sharp to tear the ear,
Pantomime breaks and reduces the act by act.
And it doesn't matter - the seagull screams
Or Brodsky's spirit rushes about.
Death is just accidental.
And that's a fact.

ZERO

He is just an image ... Empty space ...
M. Written. Marakis

When Zero is summoned to the scene,
At first as a figment of the imagination
He plays the part so skillfully
That thinking is nullified.

And now he is no longer a phantom -
It is well knocked down and well tailored.
He enters the house without hesitation, -
And after him the tenants are buried.

You can't recognize him by sight.
Its orbit is changeable.
Zero is an ernik, and his lasso
Smoothly entwined around the neck.

And with it the rotation of the earth
And the celestial rotation of the stars -
Everything draws zeros in the air:
Zero is Death. And the same zero - Motion.

Take a living soul - if you please!
(For the dead - Gogol is responsible).
While Zero flies in flight,
Let me fly by.
Do not touch -

Will knock down. You will die for a penny.
And if you rush after,
Bump into a knife around the corner
Stuck between this and this light

Faith won't save, nor pain
For those who hug the roadside
And you look in the mirror - there is Zero
Winks and laughs.

* * *

And in the park at night, when the smells of leaves are sharp,
I'm surrounded in silence on the right and left
Satyr, who appeared in the break of oak bark,
And the virgin virgin that has grown into a willow trunk.

He rushes to her from the oak, swaddled, crucified, lonely,
Tangled in cosmes, breaking through wood with shamelessness
Merry Satyr, temptation and vice embodied,
Frightening Virgo with his mischievous primacy.

Mysterious is everything that is almost not real in appearance.
And life is multidimensional, prophesying the darkness of transformations to us.
No wonder in the morning, looking down, Virgo is silent
And the dark Satyr freezes slyly until the night.

No wonder they converge so unpredictably in us
And shame, and vice, and gulba, and commitment to duty.
Otherwise, why would it not go out, lit in the shower -
Fire without which it is both dark and useless.

Why else would there be wine in my heart
For everything that is accidental, for which the words are not matched,
For the fact that before the last breath is doomed
The soul responds to the forbidden call of the night.

* * *

Over forever and everand never

End of free trial snippet