David Samoylov
An amateur photographer

He has a photo of himself
next to a girlfriend, friend and neighbor;
at leisure and in tireless labor;
holding a flute, a ball, a saber;
himself — raising glass of wine;
himself — receiving a diploma;
himself — in front of roofs and walls,
at gates of Sodom and Gomorrah;
himself — next to a dappled steed,
a monument, a tomb, a castle;
next to a grotto or a fountain;
dwarfed by a highrise or a mountain;
after a night out and before;
himself, himself, himself...
Whatever for?
He writes, poor man, not quite a sage,
his unsophisticated story.
Without awareness, still less glory
he keeps a record of the age.
And all this time he's in the midst
of stars and storms, of rains and snows,
of smiles and joys, of gasps and woes —
a single gasp, and he is dust.
Preserved on film (himself now laid
to rest) is he who labored, quietly,
to conquer life immortal via
lenses and negatives and slides.
But he had cosmos for his crib,
and was himself a tiny cosmos
of God's design, complete and flawless..
but much too simple, that's the rub.
And now he's one in a downpour
of raindrops... Who taught him to long for
the immortality of splendor
while knocking at its humble door?

Translated by Tanya Wolfson