gilhyle
28th August 2007, 19:11
I though I'd put up a draft of a version of Mandelstam's poem (that sorta got him killed). Any suggestions?
Joseph Stalin
Our lives become numb to the ground underneath,
Our talking must travel no more than ten feet,
But the instants of snatched conversation we have,
Still turn to the Kremlin Mountain Climber.
Ten thick grubs for his fingers,
Words fall from those lips like dead weights,
His upper lip's cockroach whiskers leer,
There are bright shining tips to his boots.
All around cackles of chicken necked Bosses,
He plays with the praises of half-men.
They purr, they meow and they whine,
Then, pointing his finger, he speaks.
He forges the laws in a row and he flings them,
Like horseshoes, at heads, at the eyes and at groins.
A treat is the taste from a warrant of death,
For this broad chested man of Ossette.
Osip Mandelstam, November 1933
Joseph Stalin
Our lives become numb to the ground underneath,
Our talking must travel no more than ten feet,
But the instants of snatched conversation we have,
Still turn to the Kremlin Mountain Climber.
Ten thick grubs for his fingers,
Words fall from those lips like dead weights,
His upper lip's cockroach whiskers leer,
There are bright shining tips to his boots.
All around cackles of chicken necked Bosses,
He plays with the praises of half-men.
They purr, they meow and they whine,
Then, pointing his finger, he speaks.
He forges the laws in a row and he flings them,
Like horseshoes, at heads, at the eyes and at groins.
A treat is the taste from a warrant of death,
For this broad chested man of Ossette.
Osip Mandelstam, November 1933