The stocking-lanes barking,
knitted streets of junk-rooms, idiots ducking into corners
to jump out of them-
In the pit, in the warty darkness,
I'm slipping toward the frozen pump-house.
I fall over my feet. I swallow dead air.
A fever of crows explodes.
And after that, there I am, gasping,
drumming on an icy wooden tub:
'Somebody read me! Somebody lead me! Somebody heal me!
Somebody say something on the jagged stairs !'
Voronezh. January-February I937
And yapping alleys stretched like stockings,
Streets tangled as an attic,
And cornered creatures crawling into corners
And scuttling out on the sly.
And I slither into a pit, into the calloused dark,
Towards the iced-up pump-house,
And, stumbling, munch dead air,
And the feverish rooks rise up.
And I gasp after them, hammering
On some frozen wood-pile:
Just a reader, someone to speak with, a doctor!
A conversation on the twisted stairs!
February 1937