Discernible Sound
by Andrey Kneller
Copyright 2014 by Andrey Kneller
Copyright Kneller, Boston, 2011
All rights reserved
Also by Andrey Kneller:
Wondrous Moment: Selected Poetry of Alexander Pushkin
White Flock: Poetry of Anna Akhmatova
Final Meeting: Selected Poetry of Anna Akhmatova
My Poems: Selected Poetry of Marina Tsvetaeva
Backbone Flute: Selected Poetry of Vladimir Mayakovsky
February: Selected Poetry of Boris Pasternak
The Stranger: Selected Poetry of Alexander Blok
Unfinished Flight: Selected Poetry of Vladimir Vysotsky
O, Time…: Selected Poetry of Victoria Roshe
For Lena
Table of Contents
Licked by the tongues…
Amadeus
Embrace me Silence...
Fire and Ice
November
July. White curtains…
Although the day is six feet under…
Silent Night
The sun left the vertex…
Reflect me...
The demon on my shoulder said it best…
August
Draw in the smoke…
New York
Sad Eyes
Macbeth
Fleeting Time
The thought of you vanishes...
All of us know where we’re destined…
Venice
Reflections on Existence
Ode to a Window
To ***
Autumn
Cold February. Heated furnace…
Again, it’s February…
Prayer
Venice II
Mercury climbs the thermometer…
Silence
Mid-December.
Venice III
Spring
Muse
Without a reason…
Rome
Break up
Here, on the outskirts...
To the Muse
First snow
Spring Morning
Venice IV
Sorrow
Bookmark
I refuse to love in cliches…
The sky was paler…
Her love
Venice V
Poet’s Prayer
To Pilate
Advice for a Friend
I’ve never asked you…
Beginning of a Storm
Creation of Adam
Life is beautiful!
Separation
This Love
The Muse
Until the Sun Arises
Then Olga smiled and said…
Black and White
Catharsis through prayer…
Casting smiles aside…
Despair
Seagull
Fragments
Harlem
Ophelia
32B Panorama
Melancholy
Moonlit Night
Desperate
Moment
On the Brink
Anti-War Poetry
Shotgun
The Trip
Parting
Insomnia
The Fog
I continued to kiss you…
Careful thief
Autumn. The chill draws nearer…
I wasted my nights…
Ever Since Our Pathways Crossed…
Moving On
I want to paint the world yellow…
Melancholy
Learn to forgive the poets…
The city fell silent…
Rockport
It rained. We walked.
I walk among…
Parting II
The Pianist
Portrait of a Friend
I’ve lost you…
Stranger
My mornings are gray…
Break-up
Revolution
I’ve searched for my love…
For weeks, I haven’t had moment of repose…
Love Song
I gave you my heart…
December Morning
Drunk
At a Local Dunkin Donuts
Silence
Journal Entry
O what a useless waste…
Good and Bad
Verses For Her
Summertime
Insomnia
VM
New England
The best place for writing poetry…
This campus is attractive in the spring…
Poets and prophets…
If only for the simple fact…
Happiness
Shatter
This town…
I’m from…
Katrina
The greatest lies…
Waltz
The contrast of my green eyes…
The future came…
If I run out of paper…
Ella
August 20, 2008
Let’s set some time aside for love…
Nights here are quiet…
Prayer
Elegy
Especially from up high…
During the day…
Again, I smile to myself…
SOS
I must confess…
No one cares to bring charges against me…
You surrendered to me…
I’m a hunter…
Haunted house
There were four women in my life…
They grabbed her by the neck…
My sixth sense says…
Autumn
Lullaby
Go unplug your television…
I think this calls for a drink…
Rockport in spring…
Intimate
Coffee but no cups
Cadillac, Bar Harbor
This autumn’s different from the rest…
Alexandra
We are still worlds apart…
Falling stars, on the horizon…
Dream
I love you even more for your curves…
Analyze the circumstance…
In all the beauty that was revealed to me…
I awaited a letter…
Dali was wrong…
Creation
You – on my chest…
Occupy Wall Street
To the Muse
Though often alone and happy...
On my skin...
Before you...
Before the world...
I love you most...
Emptiness in the crib...
Your hands are steady...
Much too much has been said...
Learn from toddlers...
Emptied sky...
Life’s a game…
"I can't sleep. There is a woman stuck between my eyelids. I would tell her to get out if I could. But there is a woman stuck in my throat."
Eduardo Galeano
Licked by the tongues…
Licked by the tongues of summer heat,
The day burns slowly into ashes.
As though a teardrop from the lashes,
A drop of ink falls on the sheet
And I, as lonesome as that dot,
A single mark upon the page,
Sit locked inside an opened cage,
In endless space can’t find my spot.
I search but do not see a reason
Why full of images and thought
I cannot write a single word,
Why being free I feel imprisoned.
Amadeus
Each night, I am deprived of sleep and rest
Three grueling weeks and I have just begun.
; It started as a game, - now I’m obsessed,
The cards were dealt, - His will is left undone!
With every note, my Fate is drawing near
The melody resounds in her steps
Oh Melpomene, my heart is filled with fear.
I'm tangled in my notes, - my wicked webs.
I wove each line with Ariadne’s thread
My Requiem is due, I’ve lost my touch…
“Do take the music that my soul has bled
There’s more in me, - don’t hold it as a grudge!”
Embrace me Silence...
Embrace me Silence! In your presence,
So many poets seek the Muse.
And take no knowledge from your lessons...
But you and I, - we sense the essence,
We understand, - words have no use!
Fire and Ice
Both, fire and ice, before destruction
Can be tamed!
Two opposites meet in attraction, -
As a result of this reaction,
The melting ice puts out the flame!
But if one day it does expire,
The world’s demise will come from love,
Since neither ice nor blazing fire
Can mar enough
To damage more than heart’s desire!
November
A whole new day erupts, -
Horizon’s lit with embers.
The sky is pierced with drops
Of tears shed by November.
The leaves twirl in their flight,
So weak and short of breath,
While reaching for new heights,
They glide into the depths
Of dimmed reflected skies,
Where heaven quickly smears
And echoes of their cries
Send ripples through the years.
The sad fate of the lost, -
To seek the Truth in mud
When by the window crossed
The Truth is hung to rot.
Just take a look outside, -
The skin hangs off its bones!
November, crucified,
In all three voices moans...
July. White curtains…
July. White curtains. Melancholy.
The stale air is hard to breathe.
Alone I sit and stare at Holly,
Who’s doing homework, while I grieve.
Two weeks remaining. Birds are chirping.
It’s four a.m. I’m counting sheep.
Is it my conscience-- so disturbing?
My eyes are red from lack of sleep.
Spread fingers hold the heavy Norton.
Her other hand is on her lips.
While I am left to die from boredom.
Outside, the pale sunrise creeps.
The sun will rise before we know it
This day will be consumed by time.
But, until then, let’s steal a moment
From lifeless verse and boring rhyme.
I strain my eyes from lack of sleep
July. White curtains. Melancholy.
Four twenty-five. I’m counting sheep
Alone I sit and stare at Holly.
Although the day is six feet under…
Although the day is six feet under,
Your perfume in the air remains
And horses drag the fallen reins,--
Apollo's fallen into slumber.
Like ghosts at night, dark branches sway
And cast long shadows onto walls.
The creaking carriage slowly rolls...
The horses’ hooves sink into clay.
The wearied horses stray and wander.
The night is chilling, cold and grim,
And one by one, the windows dim,
Apollo’s fallen into slumber.
The heavy clouds loom with gray.
They’re undisturbed by northern winds
And leaving only rounded prints
The horses’ hooves sink into clay.
Dark skies are gliding down the lanes.
The moonlight lulls us, softly healing.
Cold corpses lie without feeling
And horses drag the fallen reins.
The darkness fills the empty halls.
Our voices lower to a whisper.
The air is turning colder, crisper.
The creaking carriage slowly rolls...
With frenzy throwing up the curtains,
September rages, filled with spite...
My darling, don’t turn off the light--
We won’t awake the sleeping servants.
Silent Night
Choking minutes with her hands,
Slowly squeezing the aorta,
Nature, with her chilling glance,
Proves to us that she’s immortal.
Naked trees with passion sway,
Sweeping stars, while none will fall.
Icy puddles mark my way, -
Dark like windows to one’s soul.
Ashen doves rest on the cable,
They observe the pale sky.
Wind, - the hand that rocks the cradle,
Softly sings a lullaby.
There, I linger, sad and wearied,
Breathing in the silent night.
Shaking lips confirm my theory, -
Even dreams here freeze in flight.
The sun left the vertex…
The sun left the vertex
And tree trunks fell slanted.
Thrown from the vortex,
Gold leaves were implanted
Alongside those bleak streets,
Where gentle and cautious,
Avoiding dark thickets,
In muddy galoshes,
We rambled on homeward
For what seemed like hours,
But, we took the long road
Your skin showed a faint blush.
The clear chilly evening
Was drawn with paintbrush,
Its colors were gleaming.
How softly you whispered,
“Don’t take these nights lightly”
Believe me, my sister,
I think of them nightly.
Reflect me...
“Reflect me as I am, — three-dimensional!
Do not flatten me with your exterior,
rather curve from all the conventional
and engulf first my spirit ethereal
and then patch it up with new scenery.
Swallow light and reflect its radiance,
capture everything in your vicinity,
and invert the lines of your radius
as to include all of the outwardly,--
everything that is out of your medium.
In some sense, I guess that I’m cowardly,
I’m afraid of the permanent tedium
of the life on this side of the border...
so I beg you reflect me, I’m sinking!”--
Thus I prayed to oblivious water,
as the puddles were drying and shrinking...
The demon on my shoulder said it best…
“...we consider too much the good luck of the early bird, and not enough the bad luck of the early worm.”
-F. D. Roosevelt.
The demon on my shoulder said it best,--
"The grass is greener when the grass is smoked,
It doesn't matter on which path you've walked,
All roads will lead to Rome, both east and west...
Remember that three lefts will make a right!
That curiosity gave cats a life worth living.
And don't read novels, -- content is deceiving,
Judge by the cover and you'll be all right!
There aren't any winners when there's peace
Engage in fights as often as you wish!
Learn that the worms will catch the early fish,
And that
the second mouse gets the cheese!
For every penny saved, a second's lost...
If time is money, -- do not sell it short!
Don't sell your soul for pennies to the Lord--
The Devil buys it at a higher cost."
August
Doors swing open on loose hinges.
Poverty’s a state of mind.
Cuddling like two gray pigeons,
Two lone shadows intertwined,
Searching in the eyes of August,
Down the emptied water-well,
While the wind, so dry and raucous,
Sweeps the body’s every cell.
Hot and humid, lustful dreams,--
Women wearing see-though gowns.
The temptations will not cease.
In the chest, the clock resounds.
Hands of time strike faster, harder,
Almost echoing the heart.
Autumn,-- questions disregarded,
Autumn,-- foliage in the yard...
Memory, lost in the sawdust,
Wanders aimlessly, perplexed.
There is only August, August
There is nothing coming next...
Draw in the smoke…
“...and gaze at the reflection in the mirror,
As streetlights gaze at drying puddles...”
J. Brodsky
Draw in the smoke and with the motion of a finger,
shake off the lazy fireflies, which linger
to burn to ash. Cold bathroom lights reveal your flaws,--
the bald spot in your hair, the crooked nose.
Breathe out the smoke, and nothing’s to be seen,
except the rows of plastic bottles, -- blue and green,
creams and colognes that tower high above
the bathroom sink. They’ve never caught true love.
The smoky mirror hides your grim reflection
and now, none of your flaws remain...
Thus streetlights watch with warm affection
the puddles blurred by drops of rain.
New York
New York,--a barren city, devoid of color.
The gusting winds holler
At pedestrians crossing the zebra.
Mercury’s frozen at zero.
The passage of time cares not for infants,
But here, even nymphets
Lack vital signs and only cold statues
Appear to capture
The chill that stitches these side streets.
Each morning, the eye greets
The hung-over clouds, like drying clothes.
And each night, the moths
Anxiously soar to the burning candle,
And clocks strike the temple
With a pulse that can keep you awake
At your wake.
Sad Eyes
Sad eyes reflect crooked mirrors and only.
The parrots mock you by being quiet,
And nothing can drive one to be this lonely
Only the silence when you can’t deny it.
The heartbeat subsides to hear the clocks’ crow, --
It’s only eleven, but the ball is long over
And Cinderella is turned into a beast to show
That the night doesn’t want to see you sober.
On nights like this, it no longer matters
Whether the legs can find the way to the bedroom.
The body hits concrete, seeking a mattress,
And helplessly slides six feet under in tantrum.