Nativity Poems

by Brodsky, Joseph; Brodsky, Joseph; Green, Melissa; Heaney, Seamus; Maxwell, Glyn; Muldoon, Paul; Walcott, Derek; Wilbur, Richard; Lemkhin, Mikhail; Hecht, Anthony

• ISBN13: 9780374528577
• ISBN10: 0374528578
• Edition: Bilingual
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2002-11-13
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Summary

Christmas poems by the Nobel Laureate To Him, all things seemed enormous: His mother's breast, the steam out of the ox's nostrils, Caspar, Balthazar, Melchior, the team of Magi, the presents heaped by the door, ajar. He was but a dot, and a dot was the star. Joseph Brodsky, who jokingly referred to himself "a Christian by correspondence," endeavored from the time he "first took to writing poems seriously," to write a poem for every Christmas. He said in an interview: "What is remarkable about Christmas? The fact that what we're dealing with here is the calculation of life--or, at the very least, existence--in the consciousness of an individual, a specific individual." He continued "I liked that concentration of everything in one place--which is what you have in that cave scene." There resulted a remarkable sequence of poems about time, eternity, and love, spanning a lifetime of metaphysical reflection and formal invention. In Nativity Poems six superb poets in English have come together to translate the ten as yet untranslated poems from this sequence, and the poems are presented in English in their entirety for the first time, in a beautiful, pocket-sized edition drawing on the Renaissance imagery that Brodsky identified as the poems' inspiration.

Author Biography

The poet, essayist, and playwright Joseph Brodsky (1940-96) came to the United States in 1972, an involuntary exile from the Soviet Union. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1987 and served as Poet Laureate of the United States in 1991 and 1992.

Table of Contents

Christmas Ballad	p. 3
January 1, 1965	p. 9
Speech over Spilled Milk	p. 11
Anno Domini	p. 41
"A second Christmas by the shore"	p. 49
December 24, 1971	p. 53
Lagoon	p. 59
"With riverbanks of frozen chocolate, a city"	p. 69
"Snow is falling, leaving the whole world outmanned"	p. 71
Star of the Nativity	p. 73
Flight into Egypt	p. 75
"Imagine striking a match that night in the cave"	p. 79
Nativity	p. 81
Presepio	p. 83
Lullaby	p. 87
25.xii.1993	p. 95
"The air - fierce frost and pine-boughs"	p. 97
Flight into Egypt (2)	p. 99
A Conservation with Joseph Brodsky	p. 103
Editor's Note	p. 113
Table of Contents provided by Blackwell. All Rights Reserved.

Excerpts

Chapter One

CHRISTMAS BALLAD

FOR EVGENY REIN, WITH LOVE

There floats in an abiding gloom,

among immensities of brick,

a little boat of night: it seems

to sail through Alexander Park.

It's just a lonely streetlamp, though,

a yellow rose against the night,

for lovers strolling down below

      the busy street.

There floats in an abiding gloom

a drone of bees: men drunk, asleep.

In the dark capital a lone

tourist takes another snap.

Now out onto Ordynka turns

a taxicab, with sickly faces;

dead men lean into the arms

      of the low houses.

There floats in an abiding gloom

a poet in sorrow; over here

a round-faced man sells kerosene,

the sad custodian of his store.

Along a dull deserted street

an old Lothario hurries. Soon

the midnight-riding newlyweds

      sail through the gloom.

There floats in outer Moscow one

who swims at random to his loss,

and Jewish accents wander down

a dismal yellow flight of stairs.

From love toward unhappiness,

to New Year's Eve, to Sunday, floats

a good-time girl: she can't express

      what's lost inside.

Cold evening floats within your eyes

and snow is fluttering on the panes

of carriages; the wind is ice

and pale, it seals your reddened palms.

Evening lights like honey seep;

the scent of halvah's everywhere,

as Christmas Eve lifts up its sweet-

      meats in the air.

Now drifting on a dark-blue wave

across the city's gloomy sea,

there floating by, your New Year's Eve--

as if life could restart, could be

a thing of light with each day lived

successfully, and food to eat,

--as if, life having rolled to left,

      it could roll right.

1962

TRANSLATED BY GLYN MAXWELL

JANUARY 1, 1965

The kings will lose your old address.

No star will flare up to impress.

The ear may yield, under duress,

to blizzards' nagging roar.

The shadows falling off your back,

you'd snuff the candle, hit the sack,

for calendars more nights can pack

than there are candles for.

What is this? Sadness? Yes, perhaps.

A little tune that never stops.

One knows by heart its downs and ups.

May it be played on par

with things to come, with one's eclipse,

as gratefulness of eyes and lips

for what occasionally keeps

them trained on something far.

And staring up where no cloud drifts

because your sock's devoid of gifts

you'll understand this thrift: it fits

your age; it's not a slight.

It is too late for some breakthrough,

for miracles, for Santa's crew.

And suddenly you'll realize that you

yourself are a gift outright.

JANUARY 1965

TRANSLATED BY THE AUTHOR

SPEECH OVER SPILLED MILK

I

1

I arrive at Christmas without a kopeck.

The publisher's dragging on with my epic.

The Moscow calendar's going Islamic.

    I'm not going anywhere.

Not to the bawling kids of my buddy,

the family bosom, or a certain lady-friend

I know. They all cost money.

    I shake with ill will in my chair.

2

O, the damnable craft of the poet.

The phone doesn't ring, and the future? A diet.

I could scrounge at the union branch--you try it:

    may as well scrounge from the local girls.

Lost independence is worse by far

than lost innocence. To dream of a dear

hubby is awfully nice, I'm sure.

    How jolly, the jingle of wedding bells.

3

Aware of my status, my fiancée

hasn't lifted a finger to marry me

these last five years. And where is she?

    The devil can't beat out that news.

She says, "Don't cry over nothing. What matters

are feelings. All in favor?" The vote is

carried. That's good of her. Clearly she favors

    finding a place she can score some booze.

4

In general I don't trust my fellows.

To the distaff side, my extra belly's

a burden. What I think man's role is

    never fails to piss them off.

They think of me as a kind of bandit,

mock my appetite, probably find it

funny. I certainly get no credit.

    "Pour him some of the watery stuff!"

5

I see my single self in a mirror.

I can make no sense of this simple data:

that I made it to Holy Christmas number

    nineteen hundred and sixty-seven.

Twenty-six years of continuous hassle,

digging in pockets, the blows of official

fists, performing the legal shuffle,

    flirting, faking I'm slow, unspeaking.

Copyright © 2001 Estate of Joseph Brodsky.