***
It sounded so much better before I wrote it down,
even my jealousy seemed wingéd, like Marina’s.
Does the road wind up hill all the way? My teeth will rot,
but I’ll be rot, I hope, before that happens — then will words
mean what they say, finally…, then will you stop asking?
Like strawberries, late kisses make my lips itch. Lately,
All I see in whom I love, is aging, their eyes dig
deeper — dead birds underfoot. Will there be only one
rhythm in hell? One sound? Must I walk to the very
end? Cell towers have replaced the guard posts. Serpentine
parkways coil upward middle paths to mediocre
death. Science finds cigarettes addictive, I feel the same
about tomatoes. Actually it’s people, our ken
for adaptation. “It was my job,” they say, “I did
what I was told.” Yes, sir. No, sir. Let’s have ourselves one last
good laugh at ourselves and drop the curtain. That’s what I miss
most with you, that laughing, after you had found me frozen
at the bus stop, pulled me back, though you didn’t want me,
running barefoot, naked, over winter avenues.
***
Winter, I do not ache for you.
Whatever this attachment looks like
it’s not aching for looking new—no
matched pillowcases, nothing’s perfect.
So little makes me ache as does
the way you stand up out of bed,
irritably push the window
open, inhale hard smoke, cast back
one glance of cold—so many lashes.
***
Next day the world begins again, full sun
in the room can’t read the scribbling of late
last night once all had left and sleep swept down
sudden, nor brush nor water on the face.
Electric toothbrush could have saved you once —
now it’s too late, as one who would have loved
you had you brighter teeth is on a bright
journey, in stronger arms than your arms could
have strength, etcetera. There are so many
twists — as creases in the sheets, pocks in brick —
in fate. Eyes weary, obliged to write, you
have misunderstood me, all who once joyed at this
touch. How sweet — last cigarette at gallows,
at the wall; born to die how many times,
the twenty-fifth day of the month December
in droll satire’s laughter, in a game
of truths and lies (what need distinguish them
in the biography — as many I’s
as sleep through mornings, not enough, come typing,
come what may). The puce of prisms, windows
at certain slant of light, some things egged on
by electricity to hum. My shadow
on the floor to check the sentimental tear,
next to a peel of garlic on the rutted
parquet, next to grays, and lists, lists endlessly
repeating in endlessly retreating worlds.
Guests and ghosts of guests reach hands for coffee,
forget their scarves to pick up later on,
as I search for the honorary plaque,
for tombs to what will be forgotten, yet
remains where lies last winter’s fallen snow.
—
Matvei Yankelevich’s books include Some Worlds for Dr. Vogt (Black Square Editions, 2015), Alpha Donut (United Artists Books, 2012), and Boris by the Sea (Octopus Books, 2009). His translations include Today I Wrote Nothing: The Selected Writings of Daniil Kharms (Ardis/Overlook Press, 2007) and (with Eugene Ostashevsky) Alexander Vvedensky’s An Invitation for Me to Think (NYRB Poets, 2013), which received a National Translation Award. He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the New York Foundation for the Arts. He is a founding editor of Ugly Duckling Presse, where he has curated the Eastern European Poets Series since 2002. He teaches at Columbia University’s School of the Arts and the Milton Avery Graduate School of the Arts at Bard College.