508
PARTISAN REVIEW
Before, when everyone had everything, I still managed to give.
Now, when I have nothing, I still manage to give.
-All right?
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I give, like everything I do, from a sort of spiritual adventurism
- for the smile - mine and another's .
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What do I like about adventurism? - The word.
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Balmont - in a woman's crisscrossed Scottish shawl- under the
covers - frightful cold - steam rising like a stake - a plate of potatoes
fried in coffee grinds nearby:
- "Oh, this will be a shameful page in Moscow's history! I'm
not talking about myself as a poet, but as a toiler. I've translated
Shelley, Calderon, Edgar Poe . . .. Haven't I been sitting with dic–
tionaries since I was 19 instead of going out and having a good time
and falling in love?! - And I'm starving - in the literal sense. Only
death from starvation awaits! Idiots think hunger is - the body . No,
hunger is - the soul, the whole weight of it falls directly on the soul.
I'm oppressed, I'm suffering, I can't write!"
I ask for a smoke. He gives me his pipe, and orders me not to
distract myself while I smoke.
"This pipe requires a great deal of concentration, so I advise
you not to talk, since there are no matches in the house ."
I smoke, that is, I draw with all my might - the pipe seems
corked up -
1/
10 of a drag comes through with every draw - for fear
it will go out I not only don't talk, I don't think - and - after a
minute, relieved:
"Thank you - I've had enough!"
Translated from the Russian by Jamey Gambrell
