LATE VINTAGE
Inviting her home- that was a mistake.
Of course he made an effort:
prepared some lamb (a Turkish recipe),
bought a bottle of Barolo (light hints of rose and tar).
But straight away she noted:
the cracked window in the library,
the rip in the paper lampshade,
and worst of all the boiler,
which moaned as if it had a ruptured lung.
‘This is the interior of his soul’ she thought.
‘Well, maybe not the interior, maybe the landscape’.
She found ‘landscape’ a better, more lyrical term,
and having hit upon it
she grew softer, warmed a little.
Yesterday evening,
as I kissed my infant grandchildren,
I realized that tiny French and Italians
grow used to the smell of wine
while still in their cribs,
inhaling the breath of their fathers and grandfathers.
So they don’t start with the first, supervised gulp in childhood,
but with a breath.
Quick. Turn and dive into the Italian deli.
Leave the secret agents lost in the English fog.
And when you come out again,
with a bottle of Chianti,
they’re already powerless to stop you.
STRATEGY
The attack should lead along several fronts.
Target the following zones:
liver,
kidneys,
heart.
If the liver doesn’t succumb,
if the kidneys don’t fail,
then there’s always the heart.
But keep the liver in constant shock and awe:
dowse it with white,
then red.
Use beer on the kidneys.
Spirits on the heart.
Attack with everything at the same time.
Something will give in.
Just don’t lose faith.
If my son wrote poetry…..
Father would leave these lovely little circles behind him
(on sheets of paper, on tablecloths, newspapers),
imprints from glasses of Moldovan, sometimes Georgian.
Circles on the pine kitchen table,
on the oak desk with the typewriter.
Traces of my father,
of his rounded, wine-like soul:
more recognizable than a signature or a shoe.
©Igor Pomerantsev
Translated from Russian by his son Peter
Those and other poems published in Russian in “LATE VINTAGE”, November 2013
The Poetry Vaccine
Poems translated from the Russian by Peter Pomerantsev, 26.6.2020 Granta
In the good old days
Children and virgins were offered as sacrifice.
How wise!
A civilisation should sacrifice its future,
Or else what’s the point of the sacrifice?
But these days
They come for us . . .
Do they think the Gods are blind?
Senile?
But here we stand on the sacrificial altar,
Shivering, sniveling, farting.
Can’t you tell that we’re useless?
However much you try,
However much you hope,
You always end up as some set of statistic.
Homeowners or heterosexuals or failed writers.
How pointless these numbers are! What have statistics got to do with your life?
But now we have new sets:
The number of infected
(the counter is ticking)
The percentage of those infected who have died
(the counter is ticking)
The percentage of the dead over seventy
(the counter is ticking)
Only radio never shuts up during quarantine.
The world has become like a sunken submarine
Where a sailor inside needs to keep beating a hammer on the hull
Hoping to be heard upon the surface.
‘It’s cold. Steam comes out of her mouth.
The doctor says she has the Spanish Flu.
A shadow passes over my mother’s face. She’s dead.’
That’s by Mikhail Zoshenko.
But who will describe my cough?
Zoshenko’s mother was lucky.
Though –
Isn’t my son a writer too?
Yes – but the borders are closed.
He won’t be able to fly here
As they say, in good time.
It is good we are the prey.
We walk slowly. Sit in the sunshine. Pause in the window (without masks)
He doesn’t hurry. Aims. Wipes the sweat from his brow.
He takes pleasure in choosing who to hit and where:
In the sinuses, lungs, throat.
Yes it is good we are the prey.
Because if it were the children
Where would we hide them?
In the cellar? The loft?
We would shout: ‘I will tear your ear off if you dare peak out!’
And afterwards we would walk around with an ear in the hand:
That is not something you can just throw in the bin.
And this sniper is a sophisticated type.
He loves his job.
He shakes the moth balls from his suit.
Picks up a retro suitcase.
Comes round and rings the doorbell.
‘You have mice?’
‘No we have a cat. The cat catches the mice.’
‘What about Bats?’
And he just stands there quietly.
Refuses to leave.
While you hide the children in the pantry.
To summarise: we are lucky.
Let me open the window. Let him take aim.