Marina Tsvetaeva

Where does such tenderness come from? These aren’t the first curls I’ve wound around my finger— I’ve kissed lips darker than yours. The sky is washed and dark (Where does such tenderness come from?) Other eyes have known and shifted away from my eyes. But I’ve never heard words like this in the night (Where does such tenderness come from?) with my head on your chest, rest. Where does this tenderness come from? And what will I do with it? Young stranger, poet, wandering through town, you and your eyelashes—longer than anyone’s. 1916

Black mountain black mountain blocks the earth’s light. Time—time—time to give back to God his ticket. I refuse to—be. In the madhouse of the inhumans I refuse to—live. To swim on the current of human spines. I don’t need holes in my ears, no need for seeing eyes. I refuse to swim on the current of human spines. To your mad world—one answer: I refuse. • They took—suddenly—and took—openly— took mountains—and took their entrails, they took coal, and steel they took, they took lead, and crystal. And sugar they took, and took the clover, they took the West, and they took the North, they took the beehive, and took the haystack, they took the South from us, and the East. Vari—they took, and the Tatras—they took, they took our fingers—took our friends— But we stand up— as long as there’s spit in our mouths! May 9, 1939

From my hands—take this city not made by hands, my strange, my beautiful brother. Take it, church by church—all forty times forty churches, and flying up the roofs, the small pigeons; And Spassky Gates—and gates, and gates— where the Orthodox take off their hats; And the Chapel of Stars—refuge chapel— where the floor is—polished by tears; Take the circle of the five cathedrals, my coal, my soul; the domes wash us in their darkgold, And on your shoulders, from the red clouds, the Mother of God will drop her own thin coat, And you will rise, happened of wonderpowers —never ashamed you loved me. March 31 , 1916

Your name is a—bird in my hand, a piece of ice on my tongue. The lips’ quick opening. Your name—four letters. A ball caught in flight, a silver bell in my mouth. A stone thrown into a silent lake is—the sound of your name. The light click of hooves at night —your name. Your name at my temple —sharp click of a cocked gun. Your name—impossible— kiss on my eyes, the chill of closed eyelids. Your name—a kiss of snow. Blue gulp of icy spring water. With your name—sleep deepens. April 15, 1916

Our sweet companions—sharing your bunk and your bed The versts and the versts and the versts and a hunk of your bread The wheels' endless round The rivers, streaming to ground The road. . . Oh the heavenly the Gypsy the early dawn light Remember the breeze in the morning, the steppe silver-bright Wisps of blue smoke from the rise And the song of the wise Gypsy czar. . . In the dark midnight, under the ancient trees' shroud We gave you sons as perfect as night, sons As poor as the night And the nightingale chirred Your might. . . We never stopped you, companions for marvelous hours Poverty's passions, the impoverished meals we shared The fierce bonfire's glow And there, on the carpet below, Fell stars. . .

A kiss on the forehead—erases misery. I kiss your forehead. A kiss on the eyes—lifts sleeplessness. I kiss your eyes. A kiss on the lips—is a drink of water. I kiss your lips. A kiss on the forehead—erases memory. 1917

I am happy living simply: like a clock, or a calendar. Worldly pilgrim, thin, wise—as any creature. To know the spirit is my beloved. To come to things—swift as a ray of light, or a look. To live as I write: spare—the way God asks me—and friends do not. 1919

Fair enough: you people have eaten me, I—wrote you down. They’ll lay you out on a dinner table, me—on this desk. I’ve been happy with little. There are dishes I’ve never tried. But you, you people eat slowly, and often; You eat and eat. Everything was decided for us back in the ocean: Our places of action, our places of gratitude. You—with belches, I—with books, with truffles, you. With pencil, I, you and your olives, me and my rhyme, with pickles, you. I, with poems. At your head—funeral candles like thick-legged asparagus: your road out of this world a dessert table’s striped cloth. They will smoke Havana cigars on your left side and your right; your body will be dressed in the best Dutch linen. And—not to waste such expensive cloth, they will shake you out, along with the crumbs and bits of food, into the hole, the grave. You—stuffed capon, I—pigeon. Gunpowder, your soul, at the autopsy. And I will be laid out bare with only two wings to cover me. Late July 1933

Hell, my ardent sisters, be assured, Is where we’re bound; we’ll drink the pitch of hell— We, who have sung the praises of the lord With every fiber in us, every cell. We, who did not manage to devote Our nights to spinning, did not bend and sway Above a cradle—in a flimsy boat, Wrapped in a mantle, we’re now borne away. Every morning, every day, we’d rise And have the finest Chinese silks to wear; And we’d strike up the songs of paradise Around the campfire of a robbers’ lair, We, careless seamstresses (our seams all ran, Whether we sewed or not)—yet we have been Such dancers, we have played the pipes of Pan: The world was ours, each one of us a queen. First, scarcely draped in tatters, and disheveled, Then plaited with a starry diadem; We’ve been in jails, at banquets we have reveled: But the rewards of heaven, we’re lost to them, Lost in nights of starlight, in the garden Where apple trees from paradise are found. No, be assured, my gentle girls, my ardent And lovely sisters, hell is where we’re bound.

How is your life with that other one? Simpler, is it? A stroke of the oars and a long coastline— and the memory of me is soon a drifting island (not in the ocean—in the sky!) Souls—you will be sisters— sisters, not lovers. How is your life with an ordinary woman? without the god inside her? The queen supplanted— How do you breathe now? Flinch, waking up? What do you do, poor man? “Hysterics and interruptions— enough! I’ll rent my own house!” How is your life with that other, you, my own. Is the breakfast delicious? (If you get sick, don’t blame me!) How is it, living with a postcard? You who stood on Sinai. How’s your life with a tourist on Earth? Her rib (do you love her?) is it to your liking? How’s life? Do you cough? Do you hum to drown out the mice in your mind? How do you live with cheap goods: is the market rising? How’s kissing plaster-dust? Are you bored with her new body? How’s it going, with an earthly woman, with no sixth sense? Are you happy? No? In a shallow pit—how is your life, my beloved? Hard as mine with another man? 1924