The Lesson

Bubilla sits in the silvery shade
and teaches us philosophy.
His beard glimmers as if it is made
of many half-visible threads of summer rain.
He speaks distinctly,
waits for us to digest, and repeats again.

"Ze Absolute only zen attains its perfekt be,
ven it is perceived as somesing is attainable."

Two magpies sing inside the cypress-tree,
their fluid wail flows on, unlike the stable
crown that hides them.

I wonder where Bubilla got this awful
cobalt-coloured scar
that goes across his left cheek.
It looks like a storm-beaten bark
led towards the lodestar
of his violet eye occluded by the mossy eyelash.

"Ve dil viz ze aksident vich prove to be
deceit and nosing but, but our eternity
compose from aksidents as is such. – Hush !"

Bubilla doesn't like those loud magpies,
but they are far beyond his reach,
so he scratches his belly and continues to teach.

"Ze very notion for eternity is fruit of aksident.
Ironik, right ? Ve imadzin ze fulfilment
of ze evry element
ven by ze definition is finit and can't much life."

Probably, someone cut him with a knife
on one of those roads where he used to roam.
Some vagabond heard his raving speech,
looked at his gaudy garment stolen from a farm,
and assumed that he was rich.

I wonder where he would be now,
if our father did not bring him home,
he would be milking his faulty fate like a cow,
sucking in those remaining drops,
talking about Homer and the Cyclops
in the circle of slumbering farmers,
basking in the sun, floating in the rain,
living his bulky life, curious, insane,
if he could afford it, going to the brothel,
rambling there about Aristotle…

No, Bubilla was a great soldier,
this is how he got his scar.
He was a general, he led his army into the war.
He was given an order to hold a
bridge, no, an important fortress
against the innumerable armies
of bloodthirsty, nasty savages.
When the largest of them jumped on the bulwark,
Bubilla was there, he fought him bravely,
killed him after a long fierce fight
and the barbarian sword left him this mark.

I sighed with satisfaction. Everything was revealed.

But then, if Bubilla returned happily
from the war, why does he drink his night,
roaming penniless, while the lingering day
is lifted like a golden lid,
disclosing his Absolute, hopeless and grey,
why indeed ?

Yes, the military version had to be abandoned.

I looked at this huge, imposing man,
his lips curving up in an inimitable mixture
of begging and contempt. "Oh yes, I'll teach you."
Those lips said. "But I only do it now and then,
because I am divine and I study your species,
while you growl in the dirt and bite your leashes,
I soar high, with the eagle, my brother…"

No, Bubilla could not say that. Wait, I have another
explanation. He was a notorious ladies' man,
he dragged a blacksmith's wife into the barn
and had her there." This image quite excited me.
"He had her there." I repeated it with relish.
Then her husband showed up and gave him a hellish
drubbing. That's why he has this scar.

I giggled. The thought of Bubilla as a great lover
made my thoughts take hands and dance merrily.

At this stage Bubilla noticed my improper behaviour.
His eyes flared up, he turned pale,
snorted and went on:

"Ve only perceive ze Absolute srou our mortality,
mortality alon
makes uz to sink of zis important matter,
if ve ver immortal zen zis is matter is foregon."

Вланес, 2007

Сертификат Поэзия.ру: серия 790 № 50488 от 13.01.2007

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