Владимир Набоков - Стихотворения

— then you will not be lost, Isora's gift!
And I was right! At last I have encountered
my perfect enemy: another Haydn
has made me taste divine delight!. The hour
draws nigh at last. Most sacred gift of love:
You'll pass to-night into the cup of friendship.

What makes you look so gloomy?

Gloomy? No.

Mozart, there's surely something on your mind.
The dinner's good, the wine is excellent,
but you, you frown and brood.

I must confess it:
I'm worried about my Requiem.

Oh, you're writing
a Requiem? Since when?

Three weeks or so.
But the queer part… didn't I tell you?

No.

Well, listen:
three weeks ago I got home rather late —
they told me someone had been there to see me.
All night — I know not why — I lay and wondered
who it could be and what he wanted of me.
Next day the same thing happened: the man came;
I was not in. The third day — I was playing
upon the carpet with my little boy —
there came a knock: they called me, and I went;
a man, black-coated, with a courteous bow,
ordered a Requiem and disappeared.
So I sat down at once and started writing.
Now from that day to this my man in black
has never come again. — Not that I mind.
I hate the thought of parting with my work,
though now it's done. Yet in the meantime I…

You what?

I'm ashamed to say it.

To say what?

I am haunted by that man, that man in black.
He never leaves me day or night. He follows
behind me like a shadow. Even now
I seem to see him sitting here with us,
making a third.

Come, come! what childish terrors!
Dispel these hollow fancies, Beaumarchais
was wont to say to me: «Look here, old friend,
when black thoughts trouble you, uncork a bottle
of bright champagne, or reread „Figaro“».

Yes, you and Beaumarchais were boon companions,
of course — you wrote «Tarare» for Beaumarchais.
A splendid piece — especially one tune —
I always find I hum it when I'm gay:
ta-tá, ta-tá… Salieri, was it true
that Beaumarchais once poisoned someone?

No,
I doubt it. He was much too droll a fellow
for such a trade.

And then he was a genius
like you and me. And villainy and genius
are two things that don't go together, do they?

You think so?

Drink your wine.

Your health, dear friend:
here's to the frank and loyal brotherhood
of Mozart and Salieri, sons of Music.

Wait, wait! You've drunk it off. You've left me out.

Enough:
I've eaten.

Listen to this, Salieri:
my Requiem.

Are you weeping?

These are tears
I've never shed before — painful yet anodyne,
as if I had discharged a heavy debt,
as if the surgeon's knife had lopped away
a sick and throbbing limb! These tears, dear Mozart…
You must not mind them. Oh, play on, make haste,
flooding my soul with sound…

If all could feel
like you the force of harmony! But no;
the world would crumble then; for none would care
to bother with the baser needs of life;
then all would seek art's franchise. We are few,
the chosen ones, the happy idlers, we
who have no use for what is merely useful,
who worship only beauty — do we not,
dear friend? — But I'm not well — some leaden languor…
I must have sleep. Adieu!

Until we meet.

Your sleep will be a long one, Mozart! — Nay,
it cannot be that what he said was true,
and I no genius. «Villainy and genius,
two things that do not go together». Wait:
that's false — for surely there was Buonarroti.
— Or is that but a legend, but a lie,
bred by the stupid mob, by their inane
vulgarity, and that great soul who wrought
the Vatican had never sunk to murder?

«No hands have wrought my monument; no weeds
will hide nation's footpath to its site.
Tsar Alexander's column it exceeds
in splendid insubmissive height.

«Not all of me is dust. Within my song,
safe from the worm, my spirit will survive,
and my sublunar fame will dwell as long
as there is one last bard alive.

«Throughout great Rus' my echoes will extend,
and all will name me, all tongues in her use:
the Slavs' proud heir, the Finn, the Kalmuk, friend
of steppes, the yet untamed Tunguz.

«And to the people long shall I be dear
because kind feelings did my lyre extoll,
invoking freedom in an age of fear,
and mercy for the broken soul».

Obey thy God, and never mind, О Muse,
the laurels or the stings: make it thy rule
to be unstirred by praise as by abuse,
and do not contradict the fool.

Deep in the desert's misery,
far in the fury of the sand,
there stands the awesome Upas Tree
lone watchman of a lifeless land.

The wilderness, a world of thirst,
in wroth engendered it and filled
its every root, every accursed
grey leafstalk with a sap that killed.

Dissolving on the midday sun
the poison oozes through its bark,
and freezing when the day is done
gleams thick and gem-like in the dark.

No bird flies near, no tiger creeps;
alone the whirlwind, wild and black,
assails the tree of death and sweeps
away with death upon its back.

And though some roving cloud may stain
with glancing drops those leaden leaves,
the dripping of a poisoned rain
is all the burning sand receives.

But man sent man with one proud look
towards the tree, and he was gone,
the humble one, and there he took
the poison and returned at dawn.