And lo, the world turns topsy-turvy,
in other words, goes bust.
«Gosh», says the Emperor. «That was nervy,
but, in the context, just».
III
Now there’s nothing around to argue
over: no pros or cons.
«Hey, enemy!» the Emperor shouts. «Are you
there?» — There’s no response.
Now it’s pure space, devoid of mountains,
plains, and their bric-a-brac.
«Let’s», says the Emperor, «sing our anthem’s
lyrics and raise the flag».
Up flies the pennant, attended only
by two or three evening bats.
«A victory often makes one lonely»,
the Emperor says, then adds:
«Let’s have a monument, since my stallion,
white as a hyacinth,
is old and looks, as it were, quite alien;
and write on the granite plinth:
«‘Tight was the enemy’s precious anus.
We, though, stood strong and firm.’
The critics might say that we went bananas.
But we’ve got it all on film.
«Lest her sweet mutants still cry, the mother
may sing them the ancient lay.
The future as such has no purpose, other
than pushing down Replay».
At sunset, everything looks quite pretty.
Down goes the temperature.
The world lies motionless, like a treaty
without a signature.
The stars start to twinkle, remote and jolly.
The eye travels rather far.
One feels a little bit melancholy.
But there is one’s cigar.
ANTHEM
Praised be the climate
for putting a limit,
after a fashion,
to time in motion.
Of all prisons
the Four Seasons
has the best diet
and welcomes riot.
Asked for its origin
a climate cites oxygen,
but gives no reasons
for its omnipresence.
Detached like Confucius,
hardly conscious,
it may not love us,
but murmurs, «Always».
Being finite,
we certainly find it
promising and heartwarming,
though it’s a warning.
A climate’s permanence
is caused by the prevalence
of nothingness in its texture
and atmospheric pressure.
Hence, the barometer,
with its Byronic air,
should be, I reckon,
our only icon.
Since the accuracy of mercury
beats that of memory
(which is also mortal),
climate is moral.
When it exhibits
its bad habits,
it blames not parents
but ocean currents.
Or charged with the tedium
and meaninglessness of its idiom,
it won’t seek legal
aid and goes local.
Keen on history,
it’s also well versed in the mystery
of the hereafter
and looks like their author.
What I have in common
with the ancient Roman
is not a Caesar,
but the weather.
Likewise, the main features
I share with the future’s
mutants are those curious
shapes of cumulus.
Praised be the entity
incapable of enmity
and likewise finicky
when it comes to affinity.
Yet if one aspect
of this highly abstract
thing is its gratitude
for finding latitude,
then a rational anthem
sung by one atom
to the rest of matter
should please the latter.
ELEGY
Whether you fished me bravely out of the Pacific
or I pried your shell wide open by the Atlantic
now matters little. A different kind of ocean
erodes nowadays what seemed fairly rocky
and presumably insinuates itself
into your hairdo as well — obliterating
as much as conquering. And, as the poet said,
thou art far in humanity, what with your offspring now
breaking new hearts and balls across this continent,
which is what, I hope, we still have in common.
Still, they are only half you. In a court of law
the inheritance of your mesmerizing beauty
that I thought immortal will be awarded
to nobody, including yourself. For although the gods or genes
are generous lending their properties — say, for a trial run
in these precincts — ultimately they are selfish;
at any rate, they are more vain than you,
having eternity. Which is a far cry from
yet another rented abode in a snowbound village
somewhere up north, where perhaps at this
very moment you stare at your flimsy mirror
returning you surely less than my equally one-dimensional
memory, though to you this makes indeed no difference.
KOLO
In march the soldiers
with rifles on their shoulders.
Out run through brambles
the locals with their bundles.
Off fly the envoys
contemplating new ways
of creating symmetry
in a future cemetery.
Up go the pundits
explicating bandits.
Clearly outworded,
down go the murdered.
The expensive warriors,
sailing by on carriers
flying Old Glory,
signal hunky-dory.
Far is the neighbor,
loveless or unable,
neutral or bullied.
Near is a bullet.
Deep dig new hermits
sporting blue helmets.
Reasonable offers
manufacture orphans.
Blood as a liquid
shows no spilling limit;
one might build finally
here a refinery.
Home stay the virtuous
with their right to watch this
live, while they are dining:
it’s a mealtime dying.
Soiled turns the fabric
of the great republic.
Ethics by a ballot
is what it’s all about.