KHLEBNIKOV, Velimir

Wind is Song

Wind is song

Of whom and of what?

Of the sword's longing

To be the word.

People cherish the day of death

Like a favorite daisy.

Believe that the strings of the great

Are strummed by the East these days.

Perhaps we'll be given new pride

By the wizard of those shining mountains,

And I, of many souls captain,

Will wear a white snowcap of reason.

Where The Waxwings Used To Dwell

Where the waxwings used to dwell,

Where the pine trees softly swayed,

A flock of airy momentwills

Flew around and flew away.

Where the pine trees softly whooshed

Where the warblewings sang out

A flock of airy momentwills

Flew around and flew about.

In wild and shadowy disarray

Among the ghosts of bygone days,

Wheeled and tintinnabulated.

A flock of airy momentwills

A flock of airy momentwills!

You're warblewingish and beguilish,

You besot my soul like strumming,

Like a wave invade my heart!

Go on, ringing warblewings,

Long live airy momentwills!


On this day of blue bears

On this day of sky-blue bears

Running across quiet eyelashes,

I divine beyond the blue waters

In the cup of my eyes an order to wake.

The silver spoon of my extended eyes

Offers me a sea buoying a storm petrel;

And I see how the Russian bird flies

Through unknown lashes to the roaring sea.

A sea of heavenlove has capsized

Someone's sail in the round-blue water,

But the first storm is hopeless and gone

And from now on the journey is spring.


People in love

People in love, casting
long looks, long sighs.
Beasts in love, raising
dregs in their eyes,
choked on their bits of foam.
Suns in love, covering
night with a weft of earth,
dancing to meet, to mate.
Gods in love, forming
the trembling universe
into verse,
like Pushkin his passion
for Volkonskaia’s maid.

Translated by Paul Schmidt

Moscow, who are you?

Are you charming or charmed?
Are you forging freedom
Or chained?
What thought knits your brow?
With the world of conspire.
Perhaps you’re a window, giving light
Into another time,
Or an expert cat you’re:
Do sciences order to crucify,
Under sharp razors, the clever scholars
Who’re congealed amid their pupils
Near an old book
On the writing table?
Oh, daughter of the ages,
Oh, powder barrel – The break of your ties.


The night is full of constellations

The night is full of constellations.
What advent, what intelligence
of freedom or restraint
shines in your wide pages, book
above me, what fate must I make out
in the wide midnight sky?

Translated by Paul Schmidt