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Poems for N[atalia] Е. Shtempel
I
Unwillingly clinging to a bare land,
With an uneven sweet gait
She goes—a little bit ahead
Of a swift girlfriend and her young groom.
She is drawn by the constrained freedom
Of an uplifting imperfection.
Perhaps a clear prediction
Clings to her gait, longing to stay:
That this spring weather
Is for us a grave’s foremother,
And this will begin forever.
II
Some women are kin to damp earth,
Their each step is a resonant dirge,
They are summoned to accompany
The risen and be the first to greet the dead.
It is a crime to demand their caresses,
And it is impossible to leave them.
Today — an angel, tomorrow — a grave’s worm,
And the next day—just a shadow . . .
What was a posture will be gone . . .
Flowers are immortal, the sky is wholesome,
And everything to come — is just a promise.
May 4, 1937
The Original
Стихи к H[аталии] Е. Штемпель
I
К пустой земле невольно припадая,
Неравномерной сладкою походкой
Она идёт—чуть-чуть опережая
Подругу быструю и юношу-погодка.
Её влечёт стеснённая свобода
Одушевляющего недостатка,
И, может статься, ясная догадка
В её походке хочет задержаться —
О том, что эта вешняя погода
Для нас — праматерь гробового свода,
И это будет вечно начинаться.
II
Есть женщины, сырой земле родные,
И каждый шаг их — гулкое рыданье,
Сопровождать воскресших и впервые
Приветствовать умерших—их призванье.
И ласки требовать от них преступно,
И расставаться с ними непосильно.
Сегодня — ангел, завтра — червь могильный,
А послезавтра—только очертанье…
Что было—поступь — станет недоступно…
Цветы бессмертны. Небо целокупно.
И всё, что будет, — только обещанье.
4 мая 1937
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From Centuries Encircle Me with Fire: Selected Poems of Osip Mandelstam. A Bilingual English–Russian Edition; translations by Ian Probstein. Academic Studies Press (2022)
Osip Mandelstam [Rus. Осип Мандельштам] (14 January 1891 – 27 December 1938) was one of the greatest Russian poets of the 20th century. He was arrested in the 1930s and sent into internal exile with Nadezhda Mandelshtam, his wife. Given a reprieve of sorts, they moved to Voronezh in southwestern Russia. In 1938 Mandelstam was arrested again and sentenced to five years in a GULAG camp in the Soviet Far East. He died that year at a transit camp near Vladivostok.
Ian Probstein is a poet, scholar, and translator of poetry. His most recent book in English is The River of Time: Time-Space, Language and History in Avant-Garde, Modernist, and Contemporary Poetry. Boston: Academic Studies Press, 2017, Complete annotated edition of T. S. Eliot’s Poetry and Plays (St. Petersburg: Azbuka, 2019), Charles Bernstein. Sign Under Test: Selected Poems and Essays. (Moscow: Russian Gulliver-Center 2020).
In this collection of 34 short stories, author Alexis Levitin, travel set in hand, takes the reader on a journey across several continents – and even into space – exploring the joys of chess and its effect on the lives of those who play.
A collection of essays and reviews by Art Beck. “These pieces are selected from a steady series of essays and reviews I found myself publishing in the late aughts of the still early century.”
A collection of early poems by Zabolotsky, translated into English by Dmitri Manin. “Dmitri Manin’s translations retain the freshness of Zabolotsky’s vision.” – Boris Dralyuk
A book of wartime poems by Alexandr Kabanov, one of Ukraine’s major poets, fighting for the independence of his country by means at his disposal – words and rhymes.
Every character in these twenty-two interlinked stories is an immigrant from a place real or imaginary. (Magic realism/immigrant fiction.)
In this collection, Andrey Kneller has woven together his own poems with his translations of one of the most recognized and celebrated contemporary Russian poets, Vera Pavlova.
