Song
About Refuse and Man
Waking from a dream, startled,
Suddenly
I plunged into another dream….
Where I a painter of marvel
Dipped my brush
Into a colossal pale filled with
Sorrow, phlegm, and excrement,
And with violent strokes
I painted in multicolor
Man’s expansive universe,
Which was placed on the tripod of nothingness
As canvas.
The longings of men, I painted colorless,
With the color of pain I painted flight and arch,
And in vain I searched for the dreams of men
To paint them with the color of silence.
The roads where men hurried
I covered with rust,
And where lay their loves
I gouged holes with the end of my brush,
And where lay their eyes
I pasted pellets with rusted glue,
I planted ash, dust, and soot
Where once were the promises of men,
And from an old box I grabbed blunt and crooked nails
Which I nailed on the spots where stood their smiles…
Then, with slivers of rotting rags I covered where lay
The breasts and secrets of men.
And then I dug a bottomless pit
In the belly of man
Where I buried the last revolution of the world,
And into it I crammed
The miniscule history of equality and love,
And I plugged it with the curdled tedium of the slaughtered
And the yet-to-be-slaughtered freedoms,
And I signed my masterpiece with scratchings
By the nails of my disgust,
And I hurled it there from where I had taken it,
The putrid nothingness, revoltingly desolate.
Translated by Alec Ekmekji
Awakened by a dream with a start,
Suddenly
I ran into another dream…
And I, a painter of wonders,
Dipped my brush
Into a huge pail
Full of gloom, flegm and muddy refuse
And with furious strokes
I painted multicolored
The immense world of man
Set on the tripod of Nothing
as a canvas….
I painted the yearnings of man colorless,
All soaring arches I painted in the color of pain…
And I sought their dreams in vain,
To paint
In the color of silence….
The roads on which man ran,
I covered with rust and tarnish,
And there, where the loves of man were,
I punched holes with the grip of my brush,
And where the eyes were,
I glued frozen buttons with acidic paste…
And I spread ashes, dust and waste,
There, whers man’s promises were…
And from the old toolbox I took out blunt, twisted nails
And I nailed
There, where their smiles were…
Then I plastered decayed layers of rags
There, where the chests and secrets of men were ….
And then I dug a bottomless pit
In men’s abdomen,
And buried there the world’s last revolution,
And I shoved in there the inane fable of equality and love,
And I covered the pit with the jelled entrails
Of all slaughtered, and still to be slaughterd liberties
And I signed my masterpiece
With the nail scratchings of my disgust,
And I tossed it
Where I had picked it up last,
-- Hideously abandoned in the rotting NOTHINGNESS…!
……………………………. Zareh Melconian
Translated by Tatul Sonentz