THE POET AND THE TSAR (1)

The nether world -
the Tsars' hall.
- Who is that unbending
marble chap?

So majestic
in a golden mantle:
the pitiful gendarme
of Pushkin's glory.

He disparaged the author.
He trimmed his work.
The bestial butcher
of the Polish land.

Look more carefully.
Do NOT forget:
The singer's assassin:
Tsar Nicholas
the First.

THE TSAR AND THE POET (2)

Oh yes, the drum did sound before the troubled regiment
when we buried our leader.
The tsar's teeth provided the drum roll
for the dead singer.

Such an honour - no place for close friends.
At his head and his feet,
to the right and to the left - Atte-e-ention!
Police chests and police mugs.

How surprising - a supervised boy
unto the last resting place.
It really is something, something like:
this honour - so honourable - too much so.

And the people can see: contrary to gossip
the ruler cares about the poet.
What an honour, such an honour, a super-
honour, yes, an honour - the devil's own honour.

Whose body was it carried out secretly,
like thieves carry out their shot mate?
A traitor? No. Down the back stairs they took
Russia's brightest ornament.

July 19, 1931
Medun

MY PUSHKIN (an excerpt)

They killed Pushkin because he would not have died of his own accord, but would have lived for ever...
from a letter of 1931

The story begins as that favourite novel of all our mothers and grandmothers, Jane Eyre, began: The Secret of the Red Room.
In the red room there was a secret cupboard.
But before the secret cupboard there was something else: there was a painting in my mother's bedroom, The duel.
A snowy landscape, bare black branches, two black figures holding up a third one, leading him away towards a sled; and another black figure with his back to them, moving away. The one led away is Pushkin, the one who is moving away is d'Anthés. D'Anthés challenged Pushkin to a duel or, rather, enticed him out into the snow, there to murder him among the black leafless trees.

The first thing I knew about Pushkin was that he had been killed. Then I found out that Pushkin was a poet and that d'Anthés was a Frenchman. D'Anthés was jealous of Pushkin because he could not write poetry and challenged him to a duel or, rather, enticed him out into the snow, there to murder him with a pistol shot into the stomach. At the age of three I knew with absolute certainty that a poet had a stomach and - remembering all the poets I have ever met - became as concerned with the poet's stomach, that stomach which is often empty and which was the instrument of Pushkin's death, as with his soul. More than that, the very word "stomach" became hallowed. The simple expression "I have a stomachache" fills me with a wave of shuddering compassion that excludes all humour. That shot wounded us all in the stomach.

Goncharova was not mentioned at all. Only as a grown-up did I find out about her. Now, a lifetime later, I applaud my mother's silence on the subject. An ordinary, vulgar little tragedy acquired the status of a myth. In essence there was not third person involved in that duel. There were only two: anyone and someone. In other words, the two constants of Pushkin's own poetry: the poet and the mob. The mob, dressed this time in the uniform of a guards officer, murdered the poet. As for Goncharova or Nicholas I, they are always around.

But what was the secret of the red room? The whole house was full of secrets, was itself a secret.

The forbidden cupboard. The forbidden fruit. What was it? A huge purple-blue tome with golden inscription aslant: The Collected Works of A.S.Pushkin.

There in my sister Valeriya's book cupboard lived Pushkin, the negor with his curly hair, the whites of his eyes shining at me. But even before the shine of those whites, there was another sparkle: of my own green eyes in the looking glass. The cupboard was deceptive, with two doors, each with a mirror and there I was reflected in each of the doors, and sometimes, if a fortunate position could be found with my nose pressed against the edge of the doors, there were either two noses reflected back at me, or only one unidentifiable one.

POETRY\TSVET\PUSHKIN