Марина Цветаева
(1892-1941)
Вчера ещё в глаза
глядел,
А нынче — всё косится в сторону!
Вчера еще до птиц сидел,-
Всё жаворонки нынче — вороны!
Я глупая, а ты
умен,
Живой, а я остолбенелая.
О, вопль женщин всех времен:
«Мой милый, что тебе я сделала?!»
И слезы ей —
вода, и кровь —
Вода,- в крови, в слезах умылася!
Не мать, а мачеха — Любовь:
Не ждите ни суда, ни милости.
Увозят милых
корабли,
Уводит их дорога белая…
И стон стоит вдоль всей земли:
«Мой милый, что тебе я сделала?»
Вчера еще — в
ногах лежал!
Равнял с Китайскою державою!
Враз обе рученьки разжал,-
Жизнь выпала — копейкой ржавою!
Детоубийцей на
суду
Стою — немилая, несмелая.
Я и в аду тебе скажу:
«Мой милый, что тебе я сделала?»
Спрошу я стул,
спрошу кровать:
«За что, за что терплю и бедствую?»
«Отцеловал — колесовать:
Другую целовать»,- ответствуют.
Жить приучил в
самом огне,
Сам бросил — в степь заледенелую!
Вот что ты, милый, сделал мне!
Мой милый, что тебе — я сделала?
Всё ведаю — не
прекословь!
Вновь зрячая — уж не любовница!
Где отступается Любовь,
Там подступает Смерть-садовница.
Самo —
что дерево трясти! —
В срок яблоко спадает спелое…
— За всё, за всё меня прости,
Мой милый,- что тебе я сделала!
1920
d
Literal Translation
Just yesterday you gazed into my eyes,
But today—it’s all a side-eyed squint!
Just yesterday you sat up till the birds sang.
[But] all the skylarks today are crows!
I’m stupid, and you are clever,
Alive, while I’m confounded.
O, the howl of woman of all times:
“My dear, what have I done to you!”
And tears for her are water, and blood
Is water too; in blood and tears she washed her face!
Love is no mother, but a stepmother:
Expect neither judgment, nor mercy.
Dear ones are borne away by ships,
A white road carries them off…
And a moan hangs over all the earth:
“My dear, what have I done to you?”
Just yesterday at my feet you lay!
Tantamount to the whole Chinese empire!
Simultaneously both your little hands unclenched,
And life fell out—a rusty little coin!
Like a child killer on trial
I stand—void of grace, fainthearted.
Even in hell I’ll still say to you:
“My dear, what have I done to you?”
I’ll ask the chair, I’ll ask the bed:
“What for, why must I suffer and live in penury?
He kissed me off—to break me on the wheel,
And kiss another,” who will kiss him back.
You taught me to live in the very flame,
Then you left me—in the frozen steppeland!
That’s what you, dear, have done to me!
My dear, what have I done to you?
I know all; don’t contradict me!
I see with new eyes—I’m no longer a lover!
Where Love retreats
Death the Gardener advances.
What it is is like shaking a tree!
In due time a ripe apple falls off…
For everything, forgive me for everything,
My dear, what have I done to you!
d
Literary Translation/Adaptation
by U.R. Bowie
Just yesterday you gazed into my eyes;
Today you squint askance at all and sundry.
Just yesterday at dawn we heard the lark-cries;
Today the crow-caws lacerate and stun me.
I’m stupid; you’re the one who’s bright and clever,
You’re vibrant, you are; me, I’m mute with rue.
O, hear the howl of woman now, forever:
“My darling, dear, what have I done to you!”
A woman’s tears flow on, a bloody tableau,
She bathes her face in tears of water, blood.
No mother, Love; no, Love’s a hag, virago;
Her mercy’s buried deeply, under mud.
Stout ships our dear ones bear, alas, away,
Contrails of whiteness leaving in their lieu. . .
While that same moan hangs over spume and spray:
“My darling, dear, what have I done to you?”
Just yesterday you lay there at my feet,
As grand as all of fabled China’s glory!
Your tiny hands unclenched with mien discreet,
And Life fell out: a kopeck nugatory.
Accused of child murder, indicted I, on trial,
Fainthearted, void of grace, my soul askew.
In hell these words will echo all the while,
“My darling, dear, what have I done to you?”
I’ll ask the chair, the bed, what this betokens:
Why must I bear this pain, why suffer, whine?
He wrote me off, I’m on the wheel broken,
He’s found some other’s kisses, kissed off mine.
You taught me to live, conflagrations endure,
Then left me to languish in cold steppes’ purview;
That’s what you did to me, sweet paramour,
My darling, dear, what have I done to you?
I know all you’re up to; don’t contradict me!
I see with new eyes, I don’t grieve, I won’t pine.
When Love takes its leave, runs away and breaks free,
Then Death-Viniculturist serves up the wine.
You might say it’s something like shaking a tree,
When ripened an apple falls, lies in fresh dew . . .
For all of the everything please forgive me,
My darling, dear, for all I’ve done to you!
d
Translator’s Notes
Read out of context, the reference in the sixth stanza to
infanticide, to which the poet half pleads guilty, strikes a false note, a tone
almost of hysteria. After all, what is infanticide doing in a poem in which the
main theme is a break-up between the I poet, Tsvetaeva, and her lover? Who is,
in this case, Osip Mandelstam. But, in her personal life, the death of a child
was much on Marina Tsvetaeva’s mind in 1920. During the turmoil of the Russian
Revolution and the Civil War, there was famine in Moscow. With no one to turn
to, in 1919, Tsvetaeva placed both her daughters in a state orphanage, hoping
they would be well fed there. When Alya (Ariadna) fell ill Marina withdrew her
from the orphanage, but Irina remained there, where she died of starvation in
1920. Of all the horrendous events of Tsvetaeva’s not very long life, this
stands out out as one of the worst.
Masha Matveichuk declaims the poem:
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