Payment

Александр ФИЛАТОВ | Поэзия

Филатов

Payment

But for some grain give half a house
For the motherland a father
For a mother and father, get cold, wet earth
The war
Was a debt we would pay forever
Four orphans left alone.

The fourth, still nursing,
Small and white as a sheet
Never had any milk to drink
He lived on th edge,
As if dead or dying.

The older sister, yet a minor
Having cried out every tear
Did her best, through grief and scars
To lead her people, through the weather, foul and fair

She saved the children!..
Thank the girl for that
Those siblings, running through the village,
Those in trench-coats and military hats
For a young man, destined for yet for combat

The payment of war is truly great
See of the four kids sadly orphaned,
Returned three soldiers to the village …
How much for peace, has the common man
Paid?!

On Bread and Soldiers

There was very little bread
In the mutual distress.
Bitterly the mother watched —
I’ll attend the soldiers’ mess.

The child clung to chair and table,
He could narry take his eyes
From the barley bread so fabled —
Which temptation bid him try!

Herded round the oblong board
We were seated by the lads
Porridge, bread in both cheeks horded
All was eaten, all they had!

But now we’ve entered different times
No more branches do we wield
But I think that I was better
The way I was back then.

A Student’s Feathers

To G.F. Khomutov

As a child, I saved pocket money
To buy a set of feathers
They would be light blue and gold
Magically expensive.

I had no doubt, no need to faulter:
I would make these feathers mine,
I would be a perfect student —
And everything would fit my plan.

Every question, every problem
I would shell just like a bowl of nuts,
I will write those long dictations
Without a single lone mistake…

So I bought a set of feathers
They were both light blue and gold
Every question I left shelled,
And wrote dictations one and all.

Oh the priceless time of childhood
Was completely forgotten,
Both the questions and dictations
Give me life and concience:
«Twenty dead millions…
Minus twice as many loves…
Are the orphans also minused?!»
No answer have I found! No!

The hardest task of all is
Calculating in th billions,
With the question, same as Shakespear, —
Should the planet live or die?

I cast aside my golden feathers!…
As a student I will try
To find a good and faithful —
Answer gaining victory.

The Well

The well gave everything it had…
But let they night pass by,
And in the morning a thirsty man
Finds water cold and
Clear!
Fire is water and reason stands
The living heart within
The flame the fallen leaves that land
Burns and lights it up
The soul comes alive
For those take and drink.
So take a drink,
Yes, take it slow:
The earth with yield yet more
Of its transparent beauty drink
Of giants’ strength and power,
So you can fully live today,
That you may sow each year…
May you love, love always
Through the golden age
The well,
Where water lies
And life itself is
Seen.

Haymaking

…My father loved haymaking day!
He’d reach the day fully prepared
And merciless, he’d wake me before dawn:
«Get my son! We must finish by sundown».

So through the meadows,
The playful sounds rang out
While I got tangled in the weeds bellow
The rich hay for cows we’ll make!
Another swing…
Oh to be abed!

With each new step,
A new swing of the scyth,
While up ahead, the grass grows as a wall
A glistening army, besieged by fallen dew
And proudly boasting of the earths great power.

I envied my father’s endless stamina
He walked and walked
Jovial and stubborn.
I soon grew tired,
Sweat trickled down my face,
I tripped on stumps
And holes with little grace.

I needed air and long for a little water:
Keeping up with dad — a task proven none too easy!
He briskly walked and place the hay in rows,
And smiled back — make up for your lost time!

…Into the dusk, continued the level whistle.
And finally: We cannot do it all —
Well done!
Collect the currant leaves —
Make some tea — you’ll gulp it down and then return for more».

The porridge was so good, with plum and sweetened!
Before this day, I had not tasted such…
I lay by the fire, remembering
Its warmth
With a chilled hand.

***

The evening silently catches stars now shining.
A sleeping elk, remembering the spring.
The weeds by water are quiet, gently swaying.
The stallions from the mist have trotted to the meadow.

I cry my friends to the barn!
Was it God who gave our granny hearing?
She says: «The porridge is on and there’s meat jelly on the porch…
But you’ve taken your time young man, well done».

She’ll make a show of complaint, before she goes to sleep.
The rooster will crow in the barn all a creek.
…Fresh milk she’ll in a jug with a mug…
There is nothing on earth, stronger than sleep!

***

The thorny path to heaven was long.
I forget the way and how far,
I simply saw the one I loved,
I loved with light, passion and vigor.

She shimered on, a blueish shining star,
Easily concealed in the winds of the night sky.
She unintentionally filled my eyes with water,
And filled my chest with freedom oh so great.

I thought it better to die
In a valley, God-forsaken…
But without me, for long she could not shine —
My loved one, left out on her own.

Grandmother

In memory of L.I. Baklykova

Everywhere she worked,
for everyone she suffered,
For everyone she prayed
with loving commitment.
From her ancient cabin
she saw so much,
That she grew grey and bitter
and light as whisping smoke.

The old woman was bent by trouble,
by years how she was bent…
But everyday she trudges
for water to the river.
She asks of mother nature
for garden earth some water,
But nothing will she ask
Of lives younger than hers.

The Rowan

The rowan tree has lost its berries —
So now it stands there useless.
It has been hacked and chopped by many,
But nothing does it hold against.

It only longs to pull its notches
Back to its frozen trunk,
So the fire that would warm him through
Would flare upon the dawn.

Funny People

An eternal engine for the children
Yemelyan invinted.
But this just too much, my friends!
Yemelyan was stone drunk…
To be sure, there’s always science,
Laws and limits in the end!
This isn’t faith, he asks no icons:
The rogue will play us to the grave!

So they neared a verdict loudly,
Controversial, the whole town,
The decided that for safety —
They should break the engine down.

The town together came to Yemelyan…
But look, the engine, it has gone.
See, the children, they have flown away —
To chase after the light.

Stars

The frost now has fled to the North. To the joy of the melding snow dripping, on the long Northern side of the barn.

Thoughtful and wise as Copernicus, collecting the world into order, I often uncover the stars…but one thing I don’t understand!

It flies, shimmering faintly. It flies, declining orbit. It flies as a symbol of freed, a symbol that no one has seen. The star has destroyed any order, but the heavens are never in chaos…The one who created this star, will make this into a constelation!

The frost now has fled to the North, to the joy of evening drops, as night from the Northern hillside, trickles with watering snow.

All heaven in ranks of great splendor, like ancient artwork in a church. Order! But youngest of stars, they turn people into gods.

***

(Joke)

Musical praise to the gymnist!
A girl just as thin as rake:
Delicate as a vase from China,
But equally empty as well.

Loved One

The time you went for a swim
A swim in the warm June night
Not in the Sauna or shower,
But deep in the fresh river milk,
The key is simply not to hurry
In diving in and whatnot,
Your loved one will not decieve you
But will cry out giving in to the river!

Soon the water will calm,
In then in their turn the stars,
And in them, familiar constelations,
You’ll locate two wholly new stars.
Your loved one with you will not argue,
She is like the glorious air,
She quenches all thirst for the thirsty,
The sister of weightless water…

So masterfully she was hidden! —
Folding deep into the river,
There to fight as a woman
Avenging for all of her fears.
But listen! the waves have been stayed,
But see the color on your hands:
The river folded into your loved one,
Kiss it and she will forgive!

Who am I striving to teach here?
The spring of the signs of the summer,
The river has barely attempted
To break through the longstanding ice…
Alas we then walked on the Samara
In June, with dawn drawing nigh:
Your loved one did not prefer swimming —
The water she feared was too high.

***

Where and why should we strive to?
No definite answer was found.
Billions of years by us hurdle,
By then, we may figure it out.

Then maybe we will have answers,
The reason of existance and life,
This answer will show punctuation
Neatly put back in its place.

But my child, he knows everything:
By evening the drunken life,
Is in no hurry no reach home,
It argues with me heatedly.

And tells me that the world is good,
That man is not dying…
And life accepts us as a mother,
It doesn’t cheat. Not by a penny.

***

I let a bird see freedom —
It joyfully sings out.
I know that I should be happy,
But heavy is my heart!
Life wings clipped by disaster,
That have no strength therein.
It was I the cage who opened,
A bleeding heart lunatic!
But you fly, by dearest bird,
Grow in bravery.
May you never dream again
Of that little room…
To a burning pain
You have loved the light,
And now from this will
There is no protection.

***

We misswed the mark, forgive us God!
But each of us gave what he could:
A wife one gave, a child, his comfort —
The secrets of the horizon hide away with the sound.

Countless waves battered us,
But we didn’t suspect the deception of the compass.
A new horizon calls,
In the turquoise sea grows granite.

When we took the dream by the tale,
Our vessel fell into the wrong current:
A cliff arises, a knife to the heart!
All of this was truth, and truth is but a lie.

We died, but the song of the final hour was
Sung by the salty wind, sung about us.
And of course about that sailor,
That the horizon will catch us inevitably.

About the author:

Alexander Filatov is a Russian poet and writer from Orenburg, author of poetry collections such as Spring March, What Happens tomorrow?, Speak In Private, Work Service and Love, On The Shore Of The Fast Samara (poems and prose), children’s poems, like Masha and The Onion Porridge.

Winner of the II Regional Totskii Bard Festival of art amateur guitar songs Our common home — the Earth nominated as the Author of Poetry.

Winner of the literary competition of Valerian Pravdukhin.

 

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