Episode Details

Sergei Esenin — Fifteen Poems (1915)

Fifteen lyrics by Sergei Esenin, all from 1915 — the year the twenty-year-old village poet conquered Petrograd: crimson spilling its fingers over azure cloths as a mad troika races to the round dance, a lonely star burning over the marsh while the whole village sleeps, and two sonnets of the war — Greece summoned to take up Achilles' sword, Poland standing bright in her ruined halo. Then the year turns inward and homeward: the bird cherry breaks into fragrant white bloom beside its singing brook, a city poet is dressed as a beggar-woman and sent to the water-sprites, a dying father strings his tears into a necklace of pearls, and a tiny beggar-girl freezes at the window of a laughing house. A bride sings her farewell at the girls' party, the town closes round the poet like a cave of stone, tar blackens by the porch while old women read the coming rain, a poor wanderer prays under the evening star, a robber waits in the wormwood for the rumble of wheels, and a shy youth in a white smock and scarlet sash tears poppies for a girl who sings — but not for him.

The fifteen poems, in order: Upon Azure Cloths… (На лазоревые ткани); On Heaven's Blue Platter… (На небесном синем блюде); Greece (Греция); Poland (Польша); The Bird Cherry (Черёмуха); I Shall Dress You as a Beggar-Woman… (Я одену тебя побирушкой); O Child, I Long Wept over Your Fate… (О дитя, я долго плакал над судьбой твоей); The Beggar-Woman (Побирушка); The Girls' Party (Девичник); The Town (Город); By the Porch, in a Wretched Hollow, Tar… (У крыльца в худой логушке дёготь); The Old Women (Старухи); I Am a Poor Wanderer… (Я странник убогий); The Robber (Разбойник); A White Smock and a Scarlet Sash… (Белая свитка и алый кушак). By Sergei Esenin, in new English verse translations made for this show, read aloud over a gentle instrumental bed.

KacheliTV — Russian classics, read aloud.