TOWARDS YOUR INSOMNIA
Midnight stands like a soldier
waiting for the war’s end,
a dream within a dream
in thick night air
that catches fire and blazes suddenly,
not seeing its twin.
I was there hurrying toward your
insomnia under the crackling clay
of the roofs, with the city a whitening star
in my palm.
My hand is the vacuum cleaner
draining the night,
and I am an element of the white-hot steppe,
homogenous, hoovering up everything else.
Is my song born along the way? . . .
But how can anyone hear the voice
of the soil standing here over the subway?
Is there a correct protocol?
I was hurrying, of course, toward
your insomnia, hurrying barefoot,
peering inside key-holes,
flooding houses, and thrusting roots
into furrows,
and I was zigzagging
and I could not see my twin.
I was rushing toward your insomnia
under the sick breath of air conditioners,
all the way to the forest of the final heaven,
all the way past the hand-to-hand combat of
slaves . . . and did not see my twin.
We uprooted the city. Taking out
a puny sprout here and there, its roots
wrapped in newspaper and thrusting
them both into the emptiness of a pit.
Yes, I was hurrying . . .
we were all rushing toward
each other’s insomnia
while in the garden the falling apples
cracked on the bare soil,
cracking until everything became true . . .
cracking toward us.
I was the god, we were gods
and I did not see my twin
hurrying toward your insomnia.
THE BALUSTRADE
Now the river can be seen
beyond the railings,
both balustrade
and river emerge clearly –
now the balustrade, a pair
of hands, and the river emerge . . .
My eyes, unstable water flasks,
my body, passion and skin
in a goose-bumped pattern
of advancing steps
go, go, go toward but
hesitate . . .
The skyscraper is the same life-giving bridge,
from above the people seem like a scattered river,
the people seen from above in actual size,
see
yourself
and now love your friend
as you love
yourself . . .
Now the river can be seen
and the balustrade, a pair of hands,
and the river emerge
and the balustrade and a pair of hands . . .
No, only the river . . .
NOCTURNE
Death always finds excuses . . .
Everything blackens once born white
or created . . .
Your piano has cheated us
made us deaf
reduced us to a moment . . .
A keyboard entirely black
a sound in faded tones
a vocal cord
falsely flapping in five lines
always descending flight from necessary lines . . .
from reddening crosswalks . . .
Man is just a hollow outline
an unskillful stroke of chalk . . .
a dying out . . .
Inside the cracked skin
death always finds excuses . . .
imprudent street crosser’s fate . . .
the cracked skin overtaking you for a second
thick blood subtly crawling along . . .
There’s always someone standing
in front of the fold of the moment’s door
A fading smile in the invisible air
elusive
a heavy fog arising from the air
that smoothens the everyday snow
plays a nocturne in my ear
and minces . . .
a keyboard entirely black . . .
BY THE PATH OF THE LOST SUN
The night is torn apart giving birth
to a new but old sun,
a sun of lost paths
that become shoes, baby shoes for me,
a toy car from an old fairytale
or real diary entries
clinging firmly to my skin.
Among the dark rows of workers
I look again for knights,
feeling in my nostrils the worn-out smell of
faded banknotes.
Whether the door is wide open
or hanging in the air, pass
through.
Pass through the life, the living,
if death is real to you . . .
Can I and my armor-bearer
following on a donkey
save the beautiful heroine,
save her changing
Fate’s plot and save
in the name of the love she no longer needs?
Anachronistic dreams under
armored sheets . . .
Don Quixote, my despairing friend.
I was born too late
to meet you
and you were never born,
turning only into a letter and a hero.
Don Quixote, with your virtual bridges,
turn back the windmills of time.
Your eyes see the earth turning;
let me taste and feel
the current of the river in the opposite direction . . .
Or it is merely an occasion?
A reason to see the sun?
I was a little late
and the river became a daily flow,
a routine telephone call,
a reality . . .
Seize the moment!
The river is always motionless,
clinging firmly to the earth,
faithful
unlike
Me
and
You
and
the city . . .
In the night lit by an electric lamp
the city trims its political
façade,
making faces in the mirror
wriggling time covering with its palm the falling star
maybe the last one this night
fatal
lasting a whole life if it rains
on both our heads at the same time . . .
time was uninterested in us,
indifferent to us even . .
time is just the city,
time is me
when I cross the bridge.
Translated by Diana Der-Hovanessian and Vahe Arsen
