a poet in Russia - prison and exile,
a poet in Russia - Daniil Andreev,
Iosiph Brodsky, Mandelstam -
I'm tired of counting the lesions...
A poet in Russia - if I'm named
by beloved Country - I will go,
but I'll go out as a saint -
That's how the Russians want to see a poet.
***
Поэт в России - ссылка и тюрьма,
поэт в России- Даниил Андреев,
Иосиф Бродский, Мандельштам -
устанем мы считать потери...
Поэт в России - если позовет
страна родимая - то выйду,
и выйду я уже святой -
здесь так поэта хотят видеть.
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem
Your title PRISON AND EXILE refers to the earthly fate of poets under Bolshevism, but that dark destiny is redeemed in your last line: I WILL GO OUT AS A SAINT. / THAT'S HOW THE RUSSIANS WANT TO SEE THEIR POETS. A government, promising for seventy years to create a workers' paradise on earth, making war for all those years against its own people - but the poets kept another vision of Russia alive through all that suffering! ! You are part of that victory.//As a young man Yevtushenko met an emigre poet in Paris: how could they communicate with such different lives? Yevtushenko wrote: WHAT UNITED US? THE COMMON SPIRITUAL HOMELAND WAS RUSSIAN POETRY. IT REMAINED UNCHANGED DESPITE THE MADNESS OF SOVIET HISTORY. RUSSIAN CULTURE IS ALWAYS A SINGLE WHOLE. Amen to that.