Tribute to Leonid Engibarov

[PsilocybeLarvae]

Translated from Russian.

Mountains

A sun burnt valley in the mountains. Higher up, yellow-gray cliffs turn to purple, their precious peaks sparkling in the sun.

I and the mountains. Only the mountains and I.

Wise and eternal mountains, surrounding me on all sides, hiding me from the rest of the world, leaving only the blue ice of the sky and a flute - the brook. Wise mountains. They give one a clinking solitude, so that he understands; alone he is nobody.

She was feeling sad...

The king of clowns had a girl, who never smiled. She was a model. That is strange. A model who never smiles.

Well, she smiled, but only when she with him, with the king of clowns. But that was rare because he used to forget about her for a long time. She was feeling sad and hurt.

But when they accidentally met, she would still smile. She simply could not be cross with him. He was a king, you know!


To a nineteen year old

You are nineteen. You play ping pong, you go to a bar with your friends and shake your legs while sitting on a high stool...

You are nineteen.

Nineteen years ago I had my first stunning victory in a boxing ring and laughed at the faces of those who were telling me lamentably:

"The first victory is also the first step to defeat."

You are nineteen and so is the guy I am to compete with tomorrow. He is close to you now, and you are far away from me.

A huge ladder of nineteen years separates us, hundreds of landings - rings, on which each time from the beginning I won a right to climb up and I did climb up.

You like that self-assured guy with slanting shoulders, the main rival of famous N.

And me. I would like to jump over all the gaps and ladders, to play ping pong with you and admire your legs, while you shake them, sitting on a high stool in a bar.

Don't you understand that I do not feel the damn difference, don't you understand that I was waiting for you for nineteen years ever since my first victory. No, you don't understand, you don't see me, you are nineteen.

It's too late, time to go, tomorrow is the fight. And I will win, I will win for sure, since I have already lost so hopelessly.


A few words about Yerevan

Once, when the autumn came down from the mountains and the streets of the city turned golden brown, a clown came to Yerevan.

I don’t know if he fell in love with a swarthy long-legged girl or if it is just a fairy-tale, but the truth is that he left with his eyes full of the autumn rain.

The valley

I live in a cozy Ararat valley. The valley is like a bowl whose rims are the mountains. I live in the palms of earth. I live in the wounded palms of Abovyan.

A pickpocket

I am a pickpocket. I am the king of pickpockets. I am rich and happy. I am almost happy. It's a pity that nobody carries a heart in their pocket.


Applause

Every evening in a large auditorium I collect a storm of applause, a thousand splashes of human hands, and I bring home an armful.

You are sitting on a coach with a book in your hands, covered by a blanket.

I turn the lights on, so that you can see that what I have brought, and close the window so that it won’t fly away. The applause fills the whole room; it splashes near your feet, jumps to the ceiling and you rejoice in it like a child. I sit in an armchair and wait until it calms down. You continue playing, and I feel sad, because sooner or later every game becomes boring.

I stand up and open the windows wide. The applause breaks loose and flies away…

A minute, another, and the last clap is gone.

I turn to you. I want you to see me. I am tired, I am hungry, and my shoulders hurt. But you don’t see or hear me; the huge auditorium deafened you and shut me out.

Tomorrow I will go to collect that which you already cannot live without.

I love your eyes

I will tell your husband tomorrow: “I love her eyes!”

He will understand everything. He will understand that bread smells of the grain field and the earth steams after the rain. And he will understand! Morning comes because you open your eyes. And I love your eyes also because they are the windows through which I look at the world.


***
In the circus people do the hardest tricks.
They fly under the big top, juggle with dozens of objects, stand on their hands, and that is one of the hardest things to learn.

And it is hard not only because your shoulders are going to hurt at nights after endless training, or because your hands are going to swell and your eyes are going to fill with blood.

All that is hard, but sooner or later you will forget it. There is one thing that you will never forget though. It's when you stand on both hands, slowly raise one off the ground, and realize that you are holding the world with the other.

(c) Leonid Engibarov

[PsilocybeLarvae]

[Hrach_Techie]

Originally Posted by PsilocybeLarvae

Translated from Russian.

Mountains

A sun burnt valley in the mountains. Higher up, yellow-gray cliffs turn to purple, their precious peaks sparkling in the sun.

I and the mountains. Only the mountains and I.

Wise and eternal mountains, surrounding me on all sides, hiding me from the rest of the world, leaving only the blue ice of the sky and a flute - the brook. Wise mountains. They give one a clinking solitude, so that he understands; alone he is nobody.

She was feeling sad...

The king of clowns had a girl, who never smiled. She was a model. That is strange. A model who never smiles.

Well, she smiled, but only when she with him, with the king of clowns. But that was rare because he used to forget about her for a long time. She was feeling sad and hurt.

But when they accidentally met, she would still smile. She simply could not be cross with him. He was a king, you know!


To a nineteen year old

You are nineteen. You play ping pong, you go to a bar with your friends and shake your legs while sitting on a high stool...

You are nineteen.

Nineteen years ago I had my first stunning victory in a boxing ring and laughed at the faces of those who were telling me lamentably:

"The first victory is also the first step to defeat."

You are nineteen and so is the guy I am to compete with tomorrow. He is close to you now, and you are far away from me.

A huge ladder of nineteen years separates us, hundreds of landings - rings, on which each time from the beginning I won a right to climb up and I did climb up.

You like that self-assured guy with slanting shoulders, the main rival of famous N.

And me. I would like to jump over all the gaps and ladders, to play ping pong with you and admire your legs, while you shake them, sitting on a high stool in a bar.

Don't you understand that I do not feel the damn difference, don't you understand that I was waiting for you for nineteen years ever since my first victory. No, you don't understand, you don't see me, you are nineteen.

It's too late, time to go, tomorrow is the fight. And I will win, I will win for sure, since I have already lost so hopelessly.


A few words about Yerevan

Once, when the autumn came down from the mountains and the streets of the city turned golden brown, a clown came to Yerevan.

I don’t know if he fell in love with a swarthy long-legged girl or if it is just a fairy-tale, but the truth is that he left with his eyes full of the autumn rain.

The valley

I live in a cozy Ararat valley. The valley is like a bowl whose rims are the mountains. I live in the palms of earth. I live in the wounded palms of Abovyan.

A pickpocket

I am a pickpocket. I am the king of pickpockets. I am rich and happy. I am almost happy. It's a pity that nobody carries a heart in their pocket.


Applause

Every evening in a large auditorium I collect a storm of applause, a thousand splashes of human hands, and I bring home an armful.

You are sitting on a coach with a book in your hands, covered by a blanket.

I turn the lights on, so that you can see that what I have brought, and close the window so that it won’t fly away. The applause fills the whole room; it splashes near your feet, jumps to the ceiling and you rejoice in it like a child. I sit in an armchair and wait until it calms down. You continue playing, and I feel sad, because sooner or later every game becomes boring.

I stand up and open the windows wide. The applause breaks loose and flies away…

A minute, another, and the last clap is gone.

I turn to you. I want you to see me. I am tired, I am hungry, and my shoulders hurt. But you don’t see or hear me; the huge auditorium deafened you and shut me out.

Tomorrow I will go to collect that which you already cannot live without.

I love your eyes

I will tell your husband tomorrow: “I love her eyes!”

He will understand everything. He will understand that bread smells of the grain field and the earth steams after the rain. And he will understand! Morning comes because you open your eyes. And I love your eyes also because they are the windows through which I look at the world.


***
In the circus people do the hardest tricks.
They fly under the big top, juggle with dozens of objects, stand on their hands, and that is one of the hardest things to learn.

And it is hard not only because your shoulders are going to hurt at nights after endless training, or because your hands are going to swell and your eyes are going to fill with blood.

All that is hard, but sooner or later you will forget it. There is one thing that you will never forget though. It's when you stand on both hands, slowly raise one off the ground, and realize that you are holding the world with the other.

(c) Leonid Engibarov

a joker in the pack ...thanks Psi

[august]

very well done, Psi

[PsilocybeLarvae]

Thanks

[Sevana]

A few words about Yerevan.
The truth and nothing but the truth that the clown fell in love with Yerevan .
The most beautiful city in the world
Keep up the good work Psi

[Silver]

Brilliant!

[Gayka]

Psi
Thank you

[Dorothy]

Enjoyed it. Thank you so much!

[PsilocybeLarvae]

Thank you, girls

And hey this meant to encourage you to translate some yourself!

[Сизиф]

Excellent translation, dear Psi!

[Buka]

A big thank you for sharing this!

[PsilocybeLarvae]

The umbrella
After keeping silent for a while, she said: "But we don't have a place to live. We don't have a house". He laughed and said that he had an umbrella, a brand new one which opened once you pressed the button. An umbrella is a wonderful house, a very comfortable house for two. It is true that it does not have walls, but if you stretch your arm you can tell what season is in the street, whether the spring is gone or no.
With a house like that it is very comfortable to travel, to listen to the rain and also..
But she didn’t ask "also what?" and left him for another, somebody who had a one-room apartment with all the facilities, except probably an umbrella. And then again even if he had an umbrella why would anybody need two houses, that is silly...
Now, many years after, she finally realized what a wonderful umbrella it was, like a little parachute that could take the two of you far away especially on a rainy day...
And she is getting sad in her already three-room apartment, because the bigger the apartment is the further from each other are those who live in it. And when it is raining she is ready to throw herself out to find her umbrella, but it is hard to figure out which umbrella is yours from the 15th floor.
And then again even if you could figure it out, you never know whether the elevator is working properly.

You, Me and Sadness
The cafe is getting empty. The chairs are being moved; there is clank and clatter coming from the kitchen. It is only you, me and sadness.
I’m sorry, I know you wanted us to spend the day alone with each other, yet my sadness is with me…
You are getting angry already. You need to call. I understand. It is urgent.
The cafe is getting empty. The chairs are being moved; there is clank and clatter coming from the kitchen. It is only two of us - me and you- my sadness.

Pistol
Leaving me one morning a long-legged girl, dressed in cornflower blue, gave me a pistol. Then a year after, when (as it seemed to me) misfortune destroyed me, I thanked the fair-haired for her present, for the pistol, for it was a toy.

Toreador
She loved him.
She knew he was the most skilled torero.
He knew how to handle muleta best of all, and the shining sword seemed a continuation of his agile hand. But although he was the most subtle and the quickest, the most handsome and fearless, he never became a famous matador.
For a matador he did not know how to do the most important.
He did not know how to kill.
And that is why she loved him.

Yellow Stars
Astronomers count the yellow stars in the black sky. Their heads look up. Mine looks down.
You think it’s because you have told me “I don’t love you”?
No, no, it’s because I count the yellow stars, the yellow maple leaves on the black night asphalt.


No and Yes
I’m standing on the edge of the abyss between your No and Yes. I walk from your No toward your Yes on a thin rope wreathed out of desire, timidity and love. The rope shakes and swings; there is fathomless Loneliness underneath me, and your Yes, which seemed so tempting close, is beyond my reach now.
Still I walk, pole balancing with heavy Pride. The old good waltz of Hope, which is always played during the hardest tricks, gives me strength.
I walk trying to not look down and think that while I walk to your Yes somebody has already fetched the ladder of Well-being and reached you.
It’s getting harder and harder to walk; the wind of despair is shaking me. When it gets unbearable, all of a sudden you hurry to me yourself. I let go of heavy pole. You hug me and we fall down or fly to (what’s the difference?) one of those brightest stars which await us in the infinity of August night.
-Darling, - you tell me stroking my hair, - why did you risk, you could have fallen into the terrible Loneliness. Silly, why all that?
- But you told me No, so I had to take the risk.
- Really? – you sound surprised, - I don’t remember that.

The Yellow Rose
All my life I have been surrounded by flowers. I often gave flowers as a present, but even more often I was presented flowers (not particularly because I am good, but because of my occupation).
Flowers were thrown on the stage. I remember and love them all; proud gladioluses that did not utter a word even when their fragile stems were broken, modest carnations that were so happy when you lifted them above your head, sad and kind dahlias, talkative daisies, languorous lilies, desirable crimson roses ready to furtively show their spines even at your happiest moments, and many others. I remember and love them all.
But there is one yellow rose I love and remember most of all. It was a yellow rose with parched petals, with petals burnt at the edges. Out of thousand flowers I love the yellow rose, marked with fire most, not because it was burnt (that happens to everybody), but because the fire was coming from within.

© Leonid Engibarov

[Сизиф]

Psi-

[Outlaw]

well done!