Andrey Voznesensky
One of the group of Russian poets who first came to notice during the Khrushchev era.
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I am Goya
of the bare field, by the enemy's beak gouged
till the craters of my eyes gape
I am grief
I am the tongue
of war, the embers of cities
on the snows of the year 1941
I am hunger.
I have hurled westward the ashes of the uninvited guest!
and hammered stars into the unforgetting sky – like nails
I am Goya.
Along a parabola life like a rocket flies,
Mainly in darkness, now and then on a rainbow.
It's shameful to spot a lie and not to name it,
shameful to name it and then to shut your eyes,
shameful to call a funeral a wedding
and play the fool at funerals besides.
The urge to kill, like the urge to beget,
Is blind and sinister. Its craving is set
Today on the flesh of a hare: tomorrow it can
Howl the same way for the flesh of a man.
Everything's sliding apart.
Yet, "Long live everything!"
For the art of creation
Is older than the art of killing.
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