Translation of Poem by Nikolai Tikhonov, Николай Тихонов, "Праздничный, веселый, бесноватый," " Festive feeling, joyous and frenetic"

 

 

Николай Тихонов

(1896-1979)

 

Праздничный, веселый, бесноватый,

С марсианской жаждою творить,

Вижу я, что небо небогато,

Но про землю стоит говорить.

 

Даже породниться с нею стоит,

Снова глину замешать огнем,

Каждое желание простое

Освятить неповторимым днем.

 

Так живу, а если жить устану,

И запросится душа в траву,

И глаза, не видя, в небо взглянут,-

Адвокатов рыжих позову.

 

Пусть найдут в законах трибуналов

Те параграфы и те года,

Что в земной дороге растоптала

Дней моих разгульная орда.

 

1920

 

d

Literal Translation

Festive, joyous, frenetic,

With the thirst of a Martian to create,

I see that heaven is none too rich,

But the earth bears speaking about.

 

Even becoming kinfolks with her is worth it,

Once more to knead together clay with fire,

Each simple wish

To illumine with an unrepeatable day.

 

That’s how I live, and if I tire of living,

If my soul gets a hankering for grass,

And my eyes, unseeing, gaze up to heaven,

That’s when I’ll call for the red-haired lawyers.

 

Let them seek out in the laws of tribunals

Those clauses and those years

That the dissolute horde of all my days

Has trampled down on the earthly road.

 

d

 

Literary Translation/Adaptation by U.R. Bowie

 

Festive feeling, joyous and frenetic,

Thirsting like a Martian to conceive;

Heaven lacks in themes for my aesthetic,

But the earth is ripe for make-believe.

 

Could just make moist earth my bosom kin,

Once more stoke the fire, knead the clay;

Let each simple wish blaze from within, 

Illumined by the wonder of new day.

 

So I’ll live, and if I tire of life,

If my soul hankers for Elysian parks,

And Heaven sends relinquishment of strife,

I’ll summon then the lawyers, red-haired sharks.

 

Those shysters will seek out the clauses, laws,

Then conjure with my Book of Earthly Deeds,

All trampled down along with sins, faux pas,

By that fierce horde that led me through the weeds.

 

 

Translation of Poem by Nikolai Tikhonov, Николай Тихонов, "Мы разучились нищим подавать," "For greasing palms of beggars seems we’ve lost the knack"

                                                                  "Lemons," by Robert Papp

Nikolai Tikhonov

(1896-1979)

 

Николай Тихонов

Мы разучились нищим подавать,

Дышать над морем высотой соленой,

Встречать зарю и в лавках покупать

За медный мусор - золото лимонов.

 

Случайно к нам заходят корабли,

И рельсы груз проносят по привычке;

Пересчитай людей моей земли –

И сколько мертвых встанет в перекличке.

 

Но всем торжественно пренебрежем.

Нож сломанный в работе не годится,

Но этим черным, сломанным ножом

Разрезаны бессмертные страницы.

 

1921 г.

Строфы века. Антология русской поэзии.
Сост. Е.Евтушенко.
Минск, Москва: Полифакт, 1995.

 

d

Literal Translation

We’ve unlearned how to give [alms] to beggars,

To breathe the salt air high above the sea,

To greet sunrises and in shops to buy

For copper rubbish the gold of lemons.

 

Accidentally ships still drop in on us [to our ports],

And by force of habit the rails bring in freight;

Take a count of the people of my land—

And so many of the dead will show up in that roll call.

 

But we’ll gravely disregard all this.

A knife broken is of no use for work,

But with that black, broken knife

Immortal pages have been cut.

 

d

Literary Translation/Adaptation by U.R. Bowie

 For greasing palms of beggars seems we’ve lost the knack, 

Forgotten how to breathe salt air near seascapes sweep,

And how to watch the sunrise, how knapsack

To fill with lemons’ gold bought on the cheap.

 

By force of habit ships steam to our lands,

And freight cars still roll in on railway rail;

Ask of our landsmen for a show of hands,

Who’s live, who’s dead? the dead hands will prevail.

 

Nose in the air, we turn blind eye to all.

A knife that’s broken is no more of use,

But that defective, blackened blade withal

Are cut immortal pages, thoughts abstruse.