Saturday, June 21, 1941 and Ignatevsky Forest, and Beautiful Day
- Saturday, June 21, 1941 and Ignatevsky Forest, and Beautiful Day
Saturday, June 21, 1941
Let them dig trenches, though it’s nearly the endOf spring. The hope for salvation’s in my hands.
How I want to return to the days before the battle,To warn the ones who will be killed.
I feel the urge to say to that person over there:“Your death will whistle past if you stand here.”
I know the hour when they’ll begin the war,Who’ll survive and who’ll die a prisoner,
And which of us will turn into a hero,And who will be shot in front of his formation,
And now I see the enemy troops, a horde,I see them marching at Stalingrad.
And now I see the Russian infantry gather, waitLike clouds, then storm the Brandenburg Gates.
About the enemy, I have complete informationBetter than any reconnaissance on the front.
I’m speaking, but no one hears, or listens—They carry flowers, breathe the Saturday wind,
They take their leave, and need no special pass,Return to their homes and their coziness.
And I can’t remember how I came here,And that somehow a miracle has occurred.
I’ve forgotten everything. Through unbroken glassLight still shines. The windows still wear no paper cross.
1945 [End Page 157]
Ignatevsky Forest
The last leaves burn in self-immolationAnd rise to sky. The whole forest hereLives and breathes the same irritationWe lived and breathed in our last year.
In tear-blurred eyes the path is a mirrorAs the gloomy floodplain mirrors the shrubs.Don’t fuss, do not disturb, don’t touchOr threaten the forest’s quiet by the river.
The old life breathes here. Listen:In damp grass, slimy mushrooms appear.Though slugs gnaw their way to the core,A damp itch still tingles the skin.
You’ve known how love is like a threat—“When I come back, you’ll wish you were dead.”The sky shivers in reply, holds a maple like a rose.Let it burn hotter—till it almost reaches our eyes.
1935 [End Page 158]
Beautiful Day
Beneath the jasmine, a stonemarks a buried treasure.On the path my father stands.A beautiful beautiful day.
The gray poplar blooms,centifolia blooms,and milky grass,and behind it, roses climb.
I have never beenmore happy than then.I have never been morehappy than then.
To return is impossibleand to talk about it, forbidden—how it overflowed with bliss,that heavenly garden.
1942 [End Page 159]
Arseny Tarkovsky (1907–89) was a prominent Soviet poet and translator of poetry from many languages, including Georgian, Armenian, and Arabic. He survived the entire Soviet era by translating poetry, though he volunteered as a war correspondent during the Second World War and suffered a leg amputation. His renown grew with the publication of his first book in the 1950s and when his son (the filmmaker Andrey Tarkovsky) used readings of his father’s poems in his films The Mirror and Stalker.
Philip Metres is the author of A Concordance of Leaves (Diode, 2013), abu ghraib arias (Flying Guillotine, 2011), To See the Earth (Cleveland State, 2008), Behind the Lines: War Resistance Poetry on the American Homefront Since 1941 (University of Iowa, 2007), and other books. His work has appeared in Best American Poetry and has garnered numerous awards, including two NEA fellowships, four Ohio Arts Council Grants, the Arab American Book Award, and a 2014 Creative Workforce Fellowship. He teaches literature and creative writing at John Carroll University in Cleveland, Ohio.
Dimitri Psurtsev is a Russian poet and translator of British and American prose writers and poets (including Dylan Thomas, James Aldridge, A. S. Byatt, John Steinbeck, and Dana Gioia). His two books of poetry, Ex Roma Tertia and Tengiz Notebook, were published in Russia in 2001. He teaches translation at Moscow State Linguistic University and lives with his wife Natalia and daughter Anna outside Moscow.
