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Authors: Yuri Andrukhovych
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in this role. But
this is where the empire’s misfortune lies, in its deciding to combine the
uncombinable, the Estonians with the Turkmen. And where are we, the Ukrainians,
on its map? Somewhere in the middle? This is no consolation.
By now any local
chauvinist would have the right to say, “But we are one people! Even outwardly
we do not differ at all!” And powerless would be my arguments about Pylyp Orlyk
and the Cossack baroque. Or about Wedel and the periwinkle-adorned sword. 8 For
he would only nod at these sleeping obese people, pitiful and wretched, and
even unaware that they are pitiful and wretched. He’d only nod.
Hence, Your Royal
Mercy, I believe Your return to Ukraine would be so necessary and saving. Your
aristocratic European image, Your brilliance and Your luster, Your charisma,
Your Divine Anointment can now create a new national myth, a dazzling ideal,
You would shine as a guiding star for all these “enkos” sleeping in the train
stations of Moscow, St. Petersburg, Ashgabat, Sakhalin, Urengoi, Urinerunsk and
Redbuttsk! I impatiently await Your return and triumphant ascendance on the
Kyiv throne. Always and Forever Yours, Otto von F., Ukrainian poet.
This letter to
King Olelko the Second (Dovhoruky-Riurikid) you composed already while sitting
in the bus number 18, somewhere between the stops for 2nd Goncharov Lane and
Yablochkov Street.
Your had boarded
the bus in strict accordance with the instructions. For this is an important
state matter. Waiting at the bus stop, take the ticket out of your pocket/bag
and, having raised it above your head in the stretched right hand, enter the
bus. Once inside it, immediately punch the ticket in the punching machine.
Announce loudly if you are carrying documents for the multiple use of public
transport. Once two pleasant-looking young ladies boarded the bus and said, “We
have monthlies.” In full accordance with the instructions.
At Yablochkov
Street, as always, lots of Vietnamese got on, all of them dressed in Soviet
children’s clothing. They conversed with each other in their high-pitched
voices about something—and suddenly you had to interrupt and quickly finish
composing the letter to His Royal Mercy, as you were shocked to realize you
understood each their word.
“Did you hear,
beloved friend, the monkey sounding its call at dawn in the mountain forests?”
asked one of them.
“Yes, I heard the
monkey crying, and the drum beating, as I sipped wine until the morning in a
cool gazebo beneath the falling plum blossoms,” answered the other.
“And I too
couldn’t fall asleep until the morning, so loud was the rustle of bamboo
beneath my window and the singing of pink flamingos in the lakes . . .”
“Bidding farewell
to a dear friend, a great poet and calligrapher, I invited singers and threw a
parting banquet for him. The singers played the zithers, we teased the singers
with our jade sticks, the singers sang beautifully, tenderly biting our ears.
One of them was a fox, the other a cross-dressed princess. My friend, poet and
calligrapher, left for his mountains only at dawn; our good-byes were lengthy,
and his tears mixed with wine; he took the fox with him and left the
cross-dressed princess for me, but when I returned to my house, I only saw a pink
lotus flower on the bed. Perhaps she did not exist to begin with?”
“And yesterday
the feast of the Wandering Lanterns took place by the Golden Dragon Pagoda.
There I saw the best of the emperor’s concubines lose her fan. They were
carrying her in a walnut palanquin, and the fan fell on the grass. So I could
not fall asleep all night, overcome by the aroma of the fan lost by this beauty
. . .”
“And the bamboo
beneath my window rustled until the morning, and one could hear it growing,
growing from under the nails, bursting through skin . . .”
“In 1970 I
finished off an American just like this—from the distance of twenty yards my
knife went right between his shoulder-blades . .
this is where the empire’s misfortune lies, in its deciding to combine the
uncombinable, the Estonians with the Turkmen. And where are we, the Ukrainians,
on its map? Somewhere in the middle? This is no consolation.
By now any local
chauvinist would have the right to say, “But we are one people! Even outwardly
we do not differ at all!” And powerless would be my arguments about Pylyp Orlyk
and the Cossack baroque. Or about Wedel and the periwinkle-adorned sword. 8 For
he would only nod at these sleeping obese people, pitiful and wretched, and
even unaware that they are pitiful and wretched. He’d only nod.
Hence, Your Royal
Mercy, I believe Your return to Ukraine would be so necessary and saving. Your
aristocratic European image, Your brilliance and Your luster, Your charisma,
Your Divine Anointment can now create a new national myth, a dazzling ideal,
You would shine as a guiding star for all these “enkos” sleeping in the train
stations of Moscow, St. Petersburg, Ashgabat, Sakhalin, Urengoi, Urinerunsk and
Redbuttsk! I impatiently await Your return and triumphant ascendance on the
Kyiv throne. Always and Forever Yours, Otto von F., Ukrainian poet.
This letter to
King Olelko the Second (Dovhoruky-Riurikid) you composed already while sitting
in the bus number 18, somewhere between the stops for 2nd Goncharov Lane and
Yablochkov Street.
Your had boarded
the bus in strict accordance with the instructions. For this is an important
state matter. Waiting at the bus stop, take the ticket out of your pocket/bag
and, having raised it above your head in the stretched right hand, enter the
bus. Once inside it, immediately punch the ticket in the punching machine.
Announce loudly if you are carrying documents for the multiple use of public
transport. Once two pleasant-looking young ladies boarded the bus and said, “We
have monthlies.” In full accordance with the instructions.
At Yablochkov
Street, as always, lots of Vietnamese got on, all of them dressed in Soviet
children’s clothing. They conversed with each other in their high-pitched
voices about something—and suddenly you had to interrupt and quickly finish
composing the letter to His Royal Mercy, as you were shocked to realize you
understood each their word.
“Did you hear,
beloved friend, the monkey sounding its call at dawn in the mountain forests?”
asked one of them.
“Yes, I heard the
monkey crying, and the drum beating, as I sipped wine until the morning in a
cool gazebo beneath the falling plum blossoms,” answered the other.
“And I too
couldn’t fall asleep until the morning, so loud was the rustle of bamboo
beneath my window and the singing of pink flamingos in the lakes . . .”
“Bidding farewell
to a dear friend, a great poet and calligrapher, I invited singers and threw a
parting banquet for him. The singers played the zithers, we teased the singers
with our jade sticks, the singers sang beautifully, tenderly biting our ears.
One of them was a fox, the other a cross-dressed princess. My friend, poet and
calligrapher, left for his mountains only at dawn; our good-byes were lengthy,
and his tears mixed with wine; he took the fox with him and left the
cross-dressed princess for me, but when I returned to my house, I only saw a pink
lotus flower on the bed. Perhaps she did not exist to begin with?”
“And yesterday
the feast of the Wandering Lanterns took place by the Golden Dragon Pagoda.
There I saw the best of the emperor’s concubines lose her fan. They were
carrying her in a walnut palanquin, and the fan fell on the grass. So I could
not fall asleep all night, overcome by the aroma of the fan lost by this beauty
. . .”
“And the bamboo
beneath my window rustled until the morning, and one could hear it growing,
growing from under the nails, bursting through skin . . .”
“In 1970 I
finished off an American just like this—from the distance of twenty yards my
knife went right between his shoulder-blades . .
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