Mayakovsky the Ostrich, with Red Army Soldiers
Несет он яйца?
Уйти б, не кусается ль?
("Does it lay eggs? Might it not bite?")
Vladimir Mayakovsky
(1893-1930)
России
Вот иду я,
заморский страус,
в перьях строф, размеров и рифм.
Спрятать голову, глупый, стараюсь,
в оперенье звенящее врыв.
Я не твой, снеговая уродина.
Глубже
в перья, душа, уложись!
И иная окажется родина,
вижу —
выжжена южная жизнь.
Остров зноя.
В пальмы овазился.
«Эй,
дорогу!»
Выдумку мнут.
И опять
до другого оазиса
вью следы песками минут.
Иные жмутся —
уйти б,
не кусается ль?—
Иные изогнуты в низкую лесть.
«Мама,
а мама,
несет он яйца?»—
«Не знаю, душечка.
Должен бы несть».
Ржут этажия.
Улицы пялятся.
Обдают водой холода.
Весь истыканный в дымы и в пальцы,
переваливаю года.
Что ж, бери меня хваткой мерзкой!
Бритвой ветра перья обрей.
Пусть исчезну,
чужой и заморский,
под неистовства всех декабрей.
1916
Literal Translation
To Russia
Here I come,
an overseas ostrich,
in feathers of stanzas, meters
and rhymes.
I try, stupid me, to hide my
head,
by burying it in ringing
plumage.
I’m not yours, snowy monster.
Deeper
into feathers, soul, burrow in!
And a different homeland will
show up,
I see—
a scorched southern life,
Island of white heat.
Ovationed [neologism, mixture
of “ovation” and “vase”] in palms.
‘Hey,
make way!’
They crumple my creative
thought
And again
to another oasis
I weave in sands the footprints
of minutes.
Some shrink back,
“shouldn’t we go,
doesn’t it bite?”
Others are bent down into base
flattery.
“Momma,
Say, Momma,
Does it lay eggs?
I don’t know, dearie,
It should lay.”
The stories [of buildings]
whinny with laughter.
The streets stare with
popped-out eyes.
Frigidities drench me in water.
All studded [pierced, as with
nails] in smokes and in fingers,
I transport years.
All right then! Take me in your
icy-vile [neologism: mixture of “vile” and “frozen”] grasp!
With razor of wind shave off my
feathers.
Let me disappear,
alien and overseas I,
beneath the fury of all the
Decembers.
Literary Translation/Adaptation by U.R. Bowie
To Russia
(The Overseas Ostrich)
Here I come,
in feathers of stanzas, meter
and rhyme,
an overseas ostrich, in sum,
is what I’m.
Trying, do I, my poor noggin to
hide,
to deep under jangling of
plumage abide.
I’m not yours, you
snow-smothered monstrosity!
Deep, burrow deep
into feathers’ loquacity,
deep, o my soul, and what do I
see?
A new native land
with a dearth of ferocity,
A scorched southern beastliless
Realm of whoopee.
Isle of white heat,
Ovations of palms, clapping
their fronds, yea!
But then, “Hey,
Make way, deadbeat!”
They crumple and stomp
creativity.
And on again off am I’m,
bound for oasis, my
locomotivity,
weaving in sandiness footsteps
of time.
Some shrink away,
seem ready for flight.
“Hadn’t we better go?
Might it not bite?”
Others kowtow and suck up to
and fro.
“Momma,
Say, Momma,
does it lay eggs, poop doo?
I don’t know, smoochikins;
I’d bet that it do.”
Floors let out whinnies and
hootikins,
Alleyways pop out their eyes
into stares,
Frigidness drenches me wet with
arrears,
While fingered by smokiness,
bristling with cares,
I keep loading
and transporting years.
Go on! Grab me in your vile-ice
grip!
Shave off my plumage with razor
of wind.
Let me just blow away—
alien-ostriched, overseazed
scrap of scrip—
into your raving Decemberness
freezed.
Translator’s Note
A founder of the Futurist movement in Russian poetry,
Mayakovsky was known before the Revolution for his wild antics and hooliganism.
In the early days of the Soviet Era he was the most vociferous and best
spokesman of the Revolution. He is still known largely for his thunderous
declamations of revolutionary poetry, with his macho-man stance, and his
condemnation of the whole 18th century/19th century
lyrical tradition in Russian poetry.
But somewhere beneath all the bluster there was a truly
lyrical poet, a “cloud in trousers.” He wrote poems in which he portrayed
himself as a kind of freak, an animal tormented by the crudity of humankind.
His letters to his mistress, Lilya Brik, are full of his childlike adoration of
animals, and he signed off with drawings of small creatures, including himself
as “puppy dog.”
Tentatively dated 1916, “To Russia” expresses the
alienation of the poet in Russia’s pre-revolutionary world. In his literary
biography, Mayakovsky: A Poet in Revolution, Edward J. Brown
stresses one persistent theme: “the loneliness of the poet among philistines.”
As for the image of the ostrich, Brown writes that “Mayakovsky’s animals are
all alter egos of the poet himself, and each one expresses some aspect of his
own alienation.”
Using near-rhymes and neologisms typical of his style, in
“To Russia” the poet portrays himself as a large flightless bird wreathed in
southern plumage, alien to the frigidity and snows of Northern Russia, while
simultaneously alien to petty bourgeois life. In what seems the manifestation
almost of a persecution complex, the poor ostrich tries desperately to escape
the vulgarities of the quotidian: hiding his head in his plumage, seeking out a
more amenable desert homeland.
But there is no escape, and the persecuted bird—whose
poet-feathers consist of stanzas, meter and rhyme—must trudge on, enduring the
abuse. At one point the imagery suggests that of a turkey or chicken, being
prepared for roasting; at another point the ostrich appears to be in a zoo,
tormented by the alien gaze of the zoogoers. The end of the poem suggests a
kind of surrender: “let me just blow away;” literally, “let me disappear.” The
ostrich is roasted and ready to be gobbled up by the frenzies of frigid Decembers.
In embracing wholeheartedly the revolution of the workers
and peasants, Mayakovsky may have assumed that, finally, he could make an
accommodation with the accepted norms of the common man—who was now the New
Soviet Man. He produced propaganda for the revolutionary cause, ditties and
poster art that always bore the mark of his unique creative impulses. He went
out among the people; his poetry readings were vastly popular. But even amidst
the people he was still, in many ways, that oddball and persecuted ostrich,
penetrated by alien eyes. And the kind of revolutionary poetry that Mayakovsky
wrote--modernist poetry full of “difficult” imagery--сould never be any more
amenable to ignorant Soviet workers and peasants than it was to the unversed
bourgeoisie of Tsarist Russia.
[Note by U.R. Bowie: I am re-posting on my blog what I consider the best of my translations of Russian poetry into English.]
