Poem: A Solo for Me

A Solo for Me

You entered my humble room
With buds yet to flower —
Brought here to bloom…?
I sing a last song
To my old soul in gloom…
And you come along,
To garland my room…?

Descendant of Eve,
Deadly nutrition,
Speak your name and leave!
Your name is damnation
And bottomless abyss —
Slit your dense darkness,
Let me leap in bliss….

And then you told me,
With glittering eyes —
What was it, so soft, so balmy,
So enticing, yet hard to surmise?
I still do not apprehend,
And that night, onto sunrise,
I cried at no end….

And that word, unspoken,
That tear, never obvious,
That searing stare, ever unshaken,
That bouquet of narcissus
Incarcerated my soul
In a frame of darkness —
My doleful soul….

You left in sadness
Towards…where?
Heart full of emptiness,
And a dusky stare…
—If already up there,
From the star of my darkness
Look down and spare….

 

……………Rouben Sevak
1911
Translated by Tatul Sonentz

 

Source: Armenian Weekly Mid-West