Happy Birthday, Vladimir Mayakovsky!

“Our planet is poorly equipped for delight.

One must snatch gladness from the days that are.

In this life

it's not difficult to die.

To make life

is more difficult by far.”

When I first started out thinking about what I actually wanted to write this post about I kept on changing my mind. "Should I feature some lines in Russian?" "Should it be a long description?" "Should I let the verses speak instead?" I asked myself. And, in the midst of all that pondering, I understood that anything would have been fine, really, as long as I wrote something. I felt like he would have sat somewhere and stared at me- furrowing his brows trying to understand why the hell I was fumbling so hard to find the right words. Because, ultimately, there are none. We get so worked up in how we're trying to say things that we forget that the point is, quite simply, to say them. The fact that we have chosen to fill up with words what would have otherwise remained a blank page should be a big enough reason for our words to matter. So, here's the thing: today is Vladimir Vladimirovič Mayakovsky's Birthday. The best way to celebrate you, my beloved Mayakovsky, is to bring you out in the light, where your verses should belong, for the whole world to enjoy. For this post's cover I used one of my own pictures, one I took last year as I was in his house in Moscow. It is something of a good luck charm, in hopes I will be able to visit again, soon. Being my favourite poet, I thought I'd share some of my favourite verses here, in Russian, just like he would have wanted. After all, you can't really translate a masterpiece without losing some things, can you? Nothing more nothing less- с днём рождения, Владимир!

Мой стих дойдет 

через хребты веков 

И через головы

Поэтов и Правительств.

Мой стих дойдет, 

[...]

Мой стих 

Трудом 

Громаду лет прорвёт 

И явится 

Весомо, 

Грубо,

Зримо,

[...] 

Стихи стоят 

Свинцово-тяжело, 

Готовые и к смерти 

И к бессмертной славе. 

Поэмы замерли, 

К жерлу прижав жерло 

Нацеленных 

Зияющих заглавий. 

[...]

Для вас, 

которые 

Здоровы и ловки, 

Поэт

Вылизывал

Чахоткины плевки

Шершавым языком плаката.