I remain with what was not fully said,
With what was not fully sung, not played out,
Not written to the end, in a secret society,
In the quiet fellowship of the unsuccessful,
Who lived in rustling pages
And now talk in whispers.
They even forewarned us in youth,
but we didn’t want another fate,
And, in general, it wasn’t so bad;
And it even happens – those who didn’t finish
Laughing, didn’t finish dancing take us on trust.
We didn’t succeed, as many didn’t succeed,
For example – all world history
And, as I’ve heard, the universe itself.
But how we cackled, carried in the wind!
About what? And is that important?
They stole the baggage in the station long ago
(So they told us), and burned the books
(So they taught us), the river became shallow,
The forest was cut down and the house burned up,
And the burial mound is grown over
With thistle (So they wrote us),
And the old watchman long ago is not on the job.
Don’t tear form from content
And allow me yet to say in farewell,
That we’ve made peace with our fate,
And you just keep on in a cheerful march
Striding in platoons, showing off to elders.
by Нина Николаевна Берберова
(Nina Nikolayevna Berberova)
(1959)
translated by Albert C. Todd
Я остаюсь
Я остаюсь с недосказавшими,
С недопевшими, недоигравшими,
С недописавшими. В тайном обществе,
В тихом сообществе недоуспевших,
Которые жили в листах шелестевших
И шепотом нынче говорят.
Хоть в юности нас и предупреждали,
Но мы другой судьбы не хотели,
И, в общем, не так уж было скверно;
И даже бывает — нам верят на слово
Дохохотавшие, доплясавшие.
Мы не удались, как не удалось многое,
Например — вся мировая история
И, как я слышала, сама вселенная.
Но как мы шуршали, носясь по ветру!
О чем? Да разве это существенно?
Багаж давно украли на станции
(Так нам сказали), и книги сожгли
(Так нас учили), река обмелела,
Вырублен лес, и дом сгорел,
И затянулся чертополохом
Могильный холм (так нам писали),
А старый сторож давно не у дел.
Не отрывайте формы от содержания,
И позвольте еще сказать на прощание,
Что мы примирились с нашей судьбой.
А вы продолжайте бодрым маршем
Шагать повзводно, козыряя старшим.
Berberova’s father was an Armenian who worked in the Tsar’s Ministry of Finance; her mother came from the landed gentry. In the early 1920s Berberova’s poetry was noted in the literary salons of Petrograd. In 1922, along with her husband, Vladislav Khodasevich, she received permission to leave Russia. At first they lived with Maksim Gorky in Italy and Berlin and then settled in Paris, where they were divorced in 1932. For fifteen years Berberova worked for the Paris Russian newspaper Posledniye novosti and published several novels, the most successful of which was Tchaikovsky (1936). In 1950 she moved to the United States, where she taught at Princeton University until her retirement.
Biographical information about Berberova, p.413, ‘Twentieth Century Russian Poetry’ (1993), compiled by Yevgeny Yevtushenko (ed. Albert C. Todd and Max Hayward) , published by Fourth Estate Limited by arrangement with Doubleday of Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group Inc. (transcribed as found in the original text).
Fame came to her at the age of seventy-two when she published her autobiography, Kursiv moi (The Italics Are Mine). Caustic and unsparing , the book provoked a mixed reaction in émigré circles, but in the USSR it became a coveted item on the literary black market. In 1988 Berberova made a triumphant visit to the Soviet Union; where she discovered that she had become famous in her homeland.
Rambling At The Bridge Head 
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