Underground... Graven ossuaries.
Choir echo; vigil chants and pleas.
Rustling leaves of palms and rosemaries,
Scent of candle wax. Decay and peace...
Here are cathedrals' roots of stone.
Here I am summoned, dust and fume;
Be a seed, dissolve in crumbling loam,
Rise as a cathedral young in bloom!
Leather-bound tome of days and hours,
Forehead arch and spinal chain released
I shall lay like sacrificial flowers,
Like the colored garlands of the feast.
Wearing not the garment worth the afters,
Seeking earthly love in earthly dearth,
I partake of humble clay that suffers,
The forbearing substance of the earth.
Son's love — eyesight — I am bringing here
Like a pair of doves into the ark.
Take my blood to render crystal clear
The unholy wellspring of the dark.
Глубь земли… Источенные крипты.
Слышно пенье — погребальный клир.
Ветви пальм. Сухие эвкалипты.
Запах воска. Тление и мир…
Здесь соборов каменные корни.
Прахом в прах таинственно сойти,
Здесь истлеть, как семя в тёмном дёрне,
И цветком собора расцвести!
Милой плотью скованное время,
Своды лба и звенья позвонков
Я сложу, как радостное бремя,
Как гирлянды праздничных венков.
Не придя к конечному пределу
И земной любви не утоля,
Твоему страдающему телу
Причащаюсь, тёмная земля.
Свет очей — любовь мою сыновью
Я тебе незрячей отдаю
И своею солнечною кровью
Злое сердце мрака напою.
«To every infant love is given, — / but between work, / profits / and other stuff, / from evening to evening, / the crust of the heart grows rough. / The heart wears a body, / that body — a shirt. / and that's not all, they're obsessed! / an idiot! — / inventing cuff-links,...»
«As a kid, I was gifted with lots of love. / From childhood on, / folks / are overcome by chores. / I — / ran away once I had enough, / and procrastinated, / walking along the Rion shores. / My mom got angry: / “What a wicked child!” / My dad said his belt would teach me som...»
«In adolescence, major decisions are made. / Any fool is taught grammar and reason. / But I / was kicked out of my school in 5th grade / and thrown in and out of the Moscow prisons. / Your / apartment-sized world / is one of the littlest. / There, you breed many curly-haired lyricists...»
«You know French. / You divide / and multiply even better. / Derive easily. / Well, keep deriving, you hear me? / Tell me this — / can you sing with the buildings / together? / Do you know the language streetcars are speaking? / The human fledgling / from the egg first rises —...»