Bu-Ba-Bu Sampler-1

BU-BA-BU SAMPLER OF POETRY

X. THE FLYING HEAD

It lifts up, like a head,
a head chopped off a derelict.
It speaks, and then again
and again, its other-worldly words:
I AM THE FLYING HEAD!
Its all-seeing flying baroque-eye
streaks across the sky above the crowded square.
Blood thickens in the sky, the cut is ragged,
its shadow's heavy and deep:
I AM THE FLYING HEAD!
An invisible ax is in the city,
they dragged the headless bodies off the scaffold,
so gaping fools can drink blood cheap.
Scrape that rusty smear off the forehead
A PHANTOM -- A FLYING HEAD!
You devour television melodramas?
You're watching monsters under glass!
The wrecking ball from Fellini's Orchestra
will break through your wall head first --
I AM THE FLYING HEAD!
Remember, there's nowhere to hide!
The crowd scrambles to hide in the square!
The dark pavement is ritually washed,
and in the Renaissance heavens the beast slouches
A MASK -- A FLYING HEAD
I AM THE FLYING HEAD
I AM THE HE AD FLY
ING HEAD AM I
ING HEAD FLY I
FLY I LY I
--Victor Neborak (Translated by Virlana Tkacz and Wanda Phipps)
 Bu-Ba-Bu Sampler-2

A DRUM-TYMPANUM

(a sonnet uttered by the Flying Head)

--Paint a BABE naked BLUE

with lips the day looks BA
BU in dithyraMBs BU taBOO
put your teeth in BUBABU
poetry grows from hunchback work
a battle with money in the hump
and BUBABU will BE a BUnd
from the alphaBETs your head is weak
the BArd explodes in your lips
what the world hisses with the theater screams
you'll play a poem that's worth it all
you'll end up in Paradise (or Paris)
BU to death and with eternal life BU
and BU and BA and BUBABU
--Victor Neborak (Translated by Michael M. Naydan)

METRO FANTASY

The reflection disappears again you

in yourself are like an invisible vertical line
geometric space beyond the doors
slows down the scattered foundation
you move in the direction of a beam of light
along a mechanical tunnel in a throng
everywhere glances words and dreams
this movement is not to the sky escape not to a wasteland
borders deformed into circles
into searchings for herbal love
your life--these are veins of a maple
so translucent and thin in May
and the vertical line that fused with the sky
the deepest wombs where there is no time
and you painted an eye in the heavens
lifting up your wandering gaze
--Victor Neborak (Translated by Michael M. Naydan)
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THE GRIFFIN

My Lord, what a foolish world this is!

What anguish falls over the ruins!
Beneath the graphite black sky,
I fall in the sand. A griffin descends from the crest.

Jackdaws crow from the darkened trees.

I've fallen from my steed and lost the joust.
Now pins are growing through me,
driving hundreds of holes in my armor coat.

Take wing from me, monster of banners,

wingd lion! I've fallen out of the game.
There are daisies blooming from my sockets.
I had no sword. It was just the lute's fingerboard.

And with my wing I defend the lady who's waiting,

who's writing my name on a graphite slate
for the millionth time. Cloak her from deceit and scorn
she who's grown silent in the earth.

Why aren't you soaring? You're dancing around

my stilled arms on the moist sand.
You drink the eternal river from me,
you, so much like a raven. You're almost a raven.
--Yuri Andrukhovych (Translated by Michael M. Naydan)
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TO MRS. VARVARA L.
The coffin portrait of the townswoman Varvara Langisz
(XVIIth century) is kept in the Lviv historical museum.

I want to summon you--so warm, serene, gentle, wide-eyed--

from the night, all dressed in silk and brocade.
A single desire burns me with torment:
to take the more than two-hour train ride to you.

Further on a second desire destroys me:

"My queen, float out of the museum's dungeon!"
I'd shout out altogether from love and sadness
in the middle of the city, at midnight, in the company of a lion.

(The lion would roar with me).

And when suddenly
you'd appear to my voice--just like on the portrait,
wild music'd begin to thunder in my heart
and yet a third desire would seize me:

to stamp on my knees, like a bull before slaughter,

and to plead like a preacher joining a sect:
"Let's drink the wind. It's full of castrates.
I love your hands, your eyes, your corset.

your dress with a bodice, blouse, jacket, skirt,

and even your stockings and shoes.
I love the Easter-bread of your body,
your elbows and plaits--all of you forever!"

I'd bend over low, I'd drunkenly whisper,

I'd kiss the footprint of your footstep, Varvara,
the edge of your lace, you stupid Philistine,
you piece of trash from Market Square, you deaf reptile!
--Yuri Andrukhovych (Translated by Michael M. Naydan)
 Bu-Ba-Bu Sampler-5

LOVE!
Dedicated to V.M. Sosiura

Love Oklahoma! At night and at supper,

Like your mom and your dad quite equal.
Love Indiana. And the very same way
Love Northern and Southern Dakota!

Love Alabama in the red glow of fires,

Love her in joy in misfortune.
Be sure to love Iowa. And California, too.
And the branchy palms of Florida.

Teenybopper! It's not for your eye so blue,

And not for your physical defects,
If you stop loving Nevada
Your love will stop loving you too.

Hey guy! You have to love a hundred times

Stronger than you love your Love,
The District of Columbia and Georgia the state,
Montana along with Louisiana.

You can't love any other states

If you don't brotherly love
The Arizona fields and the charming
Alaskan Nebraskan wide open space.

This love is stronger than the lure for the vulva,

Cultivate the eternal in your soul.
Love Virginia the state like you do Virginia the Woolf.
And be sure to love--Oklahoma!

--Oleksander Irvanets (Translated by Michael M. Naydan)

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FROM THE LITERARY GROUP THE LOST LETTER

ALCOHAIKU

Today for the second time I

Cross Khreshchatyk Boulevard
And there's no-one to drink with...

Ah weightless bubble
In golden champagne...
The life of an aristocrat.

Five stars of cognac

The astrologer recalled--
I cry and laugh.

When the chestnuts bloom

And fall,
I'm always at Cafe Franois.

And when the cicada

Is chirring in the grass--
I'm a ruble short...

It seems just recently

We sat down for a drink,
And outside it's already autumn.

The phone began to ring,

I don't pick up the receiver--
A half bottle's still left.

Ah, how the bird sings,

Ah, how she sings!
I order another shot.

Yesterday I overdid it,

Falling down dead drunk--
Or maybe this is love?

I hugged a tree.
Ah, who'll take me home
Today?!
 Bu-Ba-Bu Sampler-7

The crow caws and caws.

For the life of me I can't understand--
Have I really had too much to drink?

How comically everyone below

Is holding up their heads--
I dashed from the balcony...

Always that awful dream--

Champagne and hootch
Plus vermouth and warm beer.

--Yuri Pozayak (Translated by Michael M. Naydan)