Red Letter Poem #150

 The Red Letters

 

 

In ancient Rome, feast days were indicated on the calendar by red letters.  To my mind, all poetry and art serves as a reminder that every day we wake together beneath the sun is a red-letter day.

 

                                                                                                          – Steven Ratiner

 

 

 

 

Red Letter Poem #150

 

 

 

Discussing the most recent examples of Russia’s unchecked brutality in its year-long attempt to subjugate Ukraine, an artist-friend posed this question: how can we continue attempting to make beauty, despite the suffering taking place?  My reaction came rushing out, almost a reflex: not despite – because of!  If what we’re witnessing is unchecked authoritarian power and the absolute corruption of an entire state, Putin and his generals are betting that Ukrainian lives won’t matter as much to the world as the price of gasoline, groceries, new shoes.  In a sense, they are making the case for a radical reappraisal of what we call human nature.  My hope is, of course, that global political resolve puts the lie to that proposition, and continues its support of Kiev and its defense.  But even more: that with every instance in which we express our deepest understanding of what, in simpler times, we called the soul – in every artform and social interaction – we are making the counter-claim that there are ultimate powers that go beyond that of munitions, and that sustain people in ways that the world’s treasuries cannot.  To be honest, I think my friend left the conversation thinking me naïve.  I am, perhaps – but undeterred.

 

The first time Vasyl Makhno appeared in the Red Letters, his poem was a tribute to his homeland – especially poignant because he has lived for a number of years in New York City, nearer the Hudson than the Dnieper.  His is a long-distance grieving, maintaining solidarity with the place of his birth.  But today’s poem, to my mind, sets down its roots beside a different stream: the essential human urge to create new forms of beauty, unimagined only moments earlier – and then to camp, for a time, on these green and tranquil banks.  Vasyl uses the jarring sonic experiments of the Estonian-born composer Arvo Pärt as his jumping-off point – who, in turn, uses the beatific visions of Germany’s Johann Sebastian Bach as his.  The poet is trying to make his images, his hammered syllables resonate like the cosmic textures in Pärt’s seven-minute piece.  As is always true, in poetry and music alike, the ear leads the mind which then prompts the heart; we don’t so much make sense of his stanzas as lose ourselves within their waking dream.  And if you’re like me, you exit from the poem – as I do from the music – believing that such beauty exists everywhere around us if (and no small thing, that cautionary if) we continue keeping faith with that possibility.  Recent headlines might lead us to believe otherwise.  And I’d like to take it one step further, believing that such delight – running its bow across our frazzled nerves – makes us a little less likely to brutalize those other humans whose paths we cross, let alone tolerate it as national policy.

 

Vasyl was born in Chortkiv, in the Ukrainian province of Ternopil.  A man of many talents, he is a poet, prose writer, essayist, and translator.  He’s authored fifteen collections of verse; last year’s Paper Bridge (Plamen Press) is where today’s “If Bach…” first appeared.  His writing has earned him a host of honors including the Kovaliv Fund Prize; Serbia’s International Povele Morave Prize in Poetry; the BBC Book of the Year Award (in 2015); and the Ukrainian-Jewish Literary Prize “Encounter.”  Vasyl’s work has been translated into 25 languages – and I have no difficulty believing he, too, tends bees in ink hives.   

 

 

 

If Bach Kept Bees^*

 

 

This is how hinges and screws creak

Drilled into the shutters behind his desk

Pärt listened in silence

To the golden translucence of a bee choir

 

If only bees fell in love with Bach

If only the hive was filled with music

He wouldn’t have had to cling to bowed masts

Or silks or felt pads

 

Sounds in grooves, in compressed light

In the silver composition of wings

Bach’s love for bees glows

The conductor’s baton is bent

 

From the monotonous bows

From those lonely mirrored vibrations

Cosmic dust shines all around

Smelling like ripe feathers

 

And it’s completely unclear

How Pärt will get honey from these bees

From the taut strings of horsehair

From pine for shutters and desks

 

From uncertain cosmic movements

Disharmony, chaos, darkness

From sharp edges, or round or smooth

From where we began

 

From silence or from string orchestras?

From a finger to the lips, from the membranes of the ears?

The Book of Judges or the Book of Ezra?

From the Word transformed to spirit?

In the “St. Matthew Passion,” the bees

Have quiet and heavenly voices

We will never know

Why Bach keeps bees for us

 

 

                                        ––Vasyl Makhno

     Translated by Olena Jennings

 

 

* Arvo Pärt: Wenn Bach Bienen gezüchtet hätte (If Bach had been a Beekeeper); 1976

 

 

 

The Red Letters 3.0

 

* If you would like to receive these poems every Friday in your own in-box – or would like to write in with comments or submissions – send correspondence to:

steven.arlingtonlaureate@gmail.com

 

 

* To learn more about the origins of the Red Letter Project, check out an essay I wrote for Arrowsmith Magazine:

https://www.arrowsmithpress.com/community-of-voices

 

and the Boston Area Small Press and Poetry Scene

http://dougholder.blogspot.com

 

* For updates and announcements about Red Letter projects and poetry readings, please follow me on Twitter          

@StevenRatiner