| Gennady Aygi |
Look,
already they vanish
in
the field, among grasses,
no
carriage bells now to be heard.
Like birds we stand.
Ever stronger the lonely call
of
the oriole outside the village,
the bridesmaids have set out
like sheaves of golden oats.
My voice is soft as the cuckoo's,
it will be carried off by the wind
and echo long
by
the abandoned house.
Oh, we are golden, we are scarlet!
Riding by in the light of maple leaves,
we come riding in
by
the light of wheat stubble.
The
beloved set out, and black swallow
flies to meet
the
night - pouring from her wings
the streaming rain.
And she was rich - with nine ways of walking
one-after-another in play!
Then
life
left
her with just the one.
No
one, nothing, to no end,
so my time goes past,
water flows – and no one asks it:
”How do you flow?”
I
look into the water – it is peaceful,
and I think a quiet thought:
I can still see something good,
and death too can be kind.
Suddenly
all have returned, all together,
but the shouts and the noise grow frightening,
and I stop the dream with effort,
as they stop a cart in the steppe.
And
do the sashes not fall from our waists,
and has life not passed us by -
I ask, like the cuckoo calling
or a clock striking the hours.
Again
the work time – singers and birds
grow thoughtful and fall silent,
some for a time,
and some, perhaps, forever.
A
selection from: “Salute – to Singing”
© Gennady Aygi
With the kind authorization of the author
Translation from Russian: Peter France
Published by Zephyr Press,
Gennady
Aygi, born in Shaymurzino, a village of
Chuvashia, a republic in Central Russia forming part of the
Russian Federation. Auygi’s principal source of inspiration is his own
