Ravenous Russia: (A Bestiary)
In Acapulco at the airport,
standing in line
to get on the plane
I heard that language,
flappy like a worn shoe
on a naked foot,
spoken by our fellow cellmates
from the prison of nations,
perhaps even from Kyiv,
spoken with such gusto
that my ears hurt from it,
got sick to my stomach,
threw up right there,
nearly coughed up my guts,
people said, look at that!
Montezuma’s revenge!
it’ll get you sooner or later,
even on the stairs to the plane,
language of vomit
spewing out of the mouth of the coal miner
Saturday night
because there’s no place
for his despair to go,
when he’s lying face down on the dirty sidewalk,
pressing his cheek to it,
that of his only friend,
and sees with his eye full of blood
that’s like tears
running down his face
the monotonous sopka hills of days
on the horizon of life,
language of the rotten moonshine vodka,
drunk day, after day,
by the proletariat nations
in the gray barracks of their republics,
language of the refined Stolichnaya lie
made in Moscow,
that’s distributed to all republics of the Union,
language of motherfucking
that’s stuffed in the mouths
of the people of other nations
so that they wouldn’t talk in their native language,
language of the breaking of fibers
of tongues being torn out
from the mouths of the people of other nations
so that they wouldn’t talk in their native language,
language of the babbling
coming out of the mouths of people of other nations
after their tongues have been torn out,
language of the garlic sausage
sewn on in place of their tongues
after they’d been torn out,
language of the color of blackboards
after their identity has been wiped off
the minds of the children of other nations,
language of the blank stare of Ukrainians
when they are spoken to in their native language,
language of the Ukrainian child who thinks it’s spoken to in Polish,
when it’s addressed in Ukrainian,
hearing it for the first time,
language you hear last before being shot,
language which he heard for the first time since childhood,
the deaf Vlyz’ko
when the bullet entered his brain,
language of the color of carnation
with which Vlyz’ko’s brain exploded
as he was shot in the back of his head,
language of the violet color of Kosynka’s screaming
before his being shot,
language of violets to which Kosynka was calling out
before being shot,
language of violets which shot up on the horizon
at the instant Kosynka was shot,
language of the lilac color prisoners see
through window bars at dawn
after an endless sleepless night,
language of the rose-colored dawn
reflected on the fingers of a prisoner
white from clutching the window bars all night,
language of the shape of window bars
on the other side of which the lily of the horizon bends
in the direction opposite from the head of the prisoner,
language of the lily of the head of the prisoner
which bends in the direction of the horizon
on the other side of the window bars,
language of the cement floors
that lightning-fast fly into the mouths
of those at the instant of being shot,
language of cement floors
stuck forever in the mouths of those who’d been shot,
language of the permanent taste of concrete
of those, who’d been shot,
language of the water
used to wash down the cement floor after an execution,
language of cold water poured over prisoners during interrogation,
language of cold water poured over prisoners
to bring them back to life before the execution,
language in which Hayet yelled,
punching Pluzhnyk in the face during interrogation,
language, which Pluzhnyk heard
while falling down like a brick tower in a Surrealist film,
punched in the face by Hayet,
language, in which Stalin gave orders
to create famine in Ukraine in 1933,
language, in which Kaganovich
ordered how to create famine in Ukraine in 1933,
language of his smile that spread from ear to ear
as he followed the famine in Ukraine in 1933,
language of his eyes that shone with pleasure
as he followed the famine in Ukraine in 1933,
language, which made the feet of Ukrainians
take on the color and weight of lead to stop them from moving
in order to save themselves during the famine in Ukraine in 1933,
language, which made the bodies of Ukrainians light as feathers
so that they could flee the earth and fly to heaven
during the famine in Ukraine in 1933,
language, which made Ukrainian’s swollen feet
crack and ooze stinking liquid during the famine in Ukraine in 1933,
language, which made Ukrainian children whine like spoiled brats
while dying during the famine in Ukraine in 1933,
language, which made the eyes of Ukrainians who were dying
roll under the forehead like smoke of censors rising to heaven
during the famine in Ukraine in 1933,
language of the plan to exterminate the Ukrainian nation,
one of the largest in the world,
language of the groping with his pale hand
of the blind Yuriy Shukhevych,
language of the barbed wire of cancer
in Vasyl’ Stus’ stomach,
language of the quiet death of Tykhy, Lytvyn
and ten million of other Ukrainians,
language of the ten years of silence of the exiled Shevchenko,
language of the sound of his pencil
which was forbidden to touch paper for ten years,
language of the sound of the pen scratching the paper
while signing the order forbidding him to write and paint,
you’re nothing but a huge mouth, Russia,
from the Baltic Sea to the Bering,
from the White Sea to the Black,
you devour everything—space, matter,
ideas, philosophy, religion, language,
culture, topsoil, granite, sand, wheat,
air, water, coal, iron ore, electricity,
nations, people, their family life, you
keep on swallowing, your eyes bulge out of
your head, tears run down your cheeks from the
strain, you mumble that you can’t go on, that you
want more, you’re an addict, Russia, you
can’t kick the habit of the drug called
empire, you suffer from the priapism
of imperialism, your borders bulge constantly like
pants up front, you’re not Third Rome, you’re
the Last Empire, look in the mirror—your face is all
gray and your cheeks sunken from the imperialist
cancer, when will you get well, when will your
De Gaull finally be born? time
creaks like old boards, it’s that famous
actor (Kremlin star) playing his lonely
role on the stage of history, he struts
around and proudly sticks out his hump like chest, a
minute more, and out, out will go his short
(brief) candle and silent will fall his
language, full of sound and fury that signify
nothing (there’s no doubt he won’t be able to save
the empire), it’s the May of nations, only
two in the morning, and sooner or later you’ll
have to sell that Chekhov cherry orchard of the empire
left for you by your forebearers tsars you’ve
gotten to like so much, Russia, you’ll pack your
bags and will wait in vain for the new
owner to ask you for your daughter’s hand in
marriage and for you to stay on, the noise on the
gravel path made by the wheels of the
carriage taking you to the station, from
which you’ll go on a journey you’ll never
return from will barely die down, when there’ll
be heard the sound of the ax chopping down a
tree (the cherry tree of nostalgia), which
will not worry about what’s going
on in you stone-hard sentimental
“Ravenous Russia” is Yuriy Tarnawsky’s own translation of an excerpt of Chapter 5 of his book-length poem U RA NA, first published in 1992 by M. P. Kots Publishing and reprinted in his second volume of collected poetry in Ukrainian They Don’t Exist in 1999, published by Rodovid. The title alludes to a neon sign on a decrepit hotel, in which some letters have gone out. So, for Tarnawsky, Ukraine is like a 1983 welfare hotel with the letters “K” and “I” dark. The poem was prompted by the 1986 Chornobyl explosion and deals with the situation in Ukraine during the Perestroika years. But if the situation for the country was alarming then, it is much more so now, and the author’s rage and lamenting are doubly justified to be made public today.
Oleksa Vlyz’ko (1908-1934), poet, and Hryhoriy Kosynka (1989-1934), prose writer, prominent authors, two of more than 300 other outstanding Ukrainian cultural figures executed by the Soviet regime in the 1930’s purges. According to a witness report, Kosynka behaved as described during his execution.
Yevhen Pluzhnyk (1898-1936), poet, another prominent Ukrainian author, who, gravely ill, was sentenced to a labor camp, where he died soon after being committed. M. Hayet, Pluzhnyk’s brutal interrogator.
Yuriy Shukhevych (1933-2022), son of Gen. Roman Shukhevych, commander in chief of UPA (Ukrainian Insurgent Army). While teenager, was committed to a prison camp, where he lost his eyesight.
Vasyl Stus (1938-1985), Ukrainian poet, who died in a prison camp under suspicious circumstances.
Oleksa Tykhy [Ukr. “quiet’] (1927-1984) and Yuriy Lytvyn (1934-1984), Ukrainian dissidents, who perished in Soviet concentration camps.
Famous actor, Kremlin star – Mikhail Gorbachev [Rus. “gorb” – “hump”], hence he sticks out his hump like chest.
Source: Yuriy Tarnawsky
Calling General George S. Patton
General George S. Patton died a death that was in some sense unfortunately banal. He hit his head against a partition in a car during a low-speed encounter with a truck in late 1945. But in many ways, it was a fitting way to go. Something more dramatic would have distracted from the color of his life, and anything that equaled the drama of his life would have been gruesome.
It’s worth celebrating the 79th year of his death not only because he’s a character always worthy of bringing up in people’s minds, but because he stood for many of the qualities and attitudes needed when the world is in peril. He is credited with the quote: “A pint of sweat will save a gallon of blood,” a straightforward observation from one who saw the worst horrors of war, a simple piece of advice which should have been followed by everyone involved in setting America’s policy toward Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Patton had a single-minded military career, passing on from West Point Military Academy to serve during the First World War in tank warfare, having shown his energetic persona in the pre-war Olympic Games. After the interwar years, in which he focused his attentions on building US armored capabilities, he found himself in the limelight as commander of the US Seventh Army during the Allied invasion of Sicily.
Showing extraordinarily effective leadership and drive, he eventually played a major role in Operation Fortitude, the deception plan in the lead up to D-Day. Once the beachheads were secured, he led the US Third Army in a stupendously potent offensive to drive the Nazis out of France.
Alongside his military success and leadership, one of Patton’s enduring legacies is the invective-filled, profanity-laden speeches he gave, which received the outright approval of his soldiers, and brought embarrassed rebukes by his “superiors.”
“No bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country,” he pointed out to the US 6th Armored Division, on May 31, 1944, as they prepared for the assault on Nazi-occupied Europe.
That was the least of his controversies. Who knows what would happen to him today. He would probably be dismissed from his command and sent on an “Inclusiveness and Unconscious Bias while Fighting Nazis” on-line training course or “Language and Micro-Aggressions while Preventing the Collapse of the Free World” away-day team building experience in which you learn how to say “politically challenged individual on the other team” rather than “poor dumb bastard.”
But there is much better stuff in his speech that is relevant to the current situation. He had something to say to his soldiers about America: “Men, all this stuff you hear about America not wanting to fight, wanting to stay out of the war, is a lot of horse dung. Americans love to fight. All real Americans love the sting and clash of battle. When you were kids, you all admired the champion marble shooter, the fastest runner, the big-league ball players and the toughest boxers. Americans love a winner and will not tolerate a loser. Americans play to win all the time.”
Imagine this coming out of the lips of Joseph Biden or Jake Sullivan.
Patton also had some simple things to say about bringing wars to an end. Considering that many of our enemies are now our friends (so you’ll have to accept that to modern ears his statements might make you wince a bit), the basic ideas are nothing much to argue about:
“Sure, we all want to go home. We want to get this war over with. But you can’t win a war lying down. The quickest way to get it over with is to get the bastards who started it. We want to get the hell over there and clean the goddamn thing up, and then get at those purple-pissing Japs. The quicker they are whipped, the quicker we go home. The shortest way home is through Berlin and Tokyo. So keep moving. And when we get to Berlin, I am personally going to shoot that paper-hanging son-of-a-bitch Hitler.”
And there’s more where that came from:
“I don’t want any messages saying, ‘I’m holding my position.’ We’re not holding a goddamned thing. We’re advancing constantly and we’re not interested in holding anything except the enemy’s balls. We’re going to hold him by his balls and we’re going to kick him in the ass; twist his balls and kick the living shit out of him all the time. Our plan of operation is to advance and keep on advancing. We’re going to go through the enemy like shit through a tinhorn.”
Anyway, you get the general idea, the General certainly got the idea.
You can’t have ever read this speech (I implore you to read the whole splendid thing), and then read anything that has come out of the Biden administration without sighing and throwing your arms up in despair. “We will continue to stand with the Ukrainian people as they defend against Russia’s barbaric war of aggression.” Yes, Mr. Sullivan, yes. If you say so.
The style of some of his speeches often leads people to conclude that Patton was a rough man, crass and lacking in depth, but this would be wrong. He was an avid reader on history, and his letters are thoughtful. It is a classic error to attempt to create a monochrome personality that can be easily described. Like all humans, he was a mix of sentiments and when the situation demanded it, especially in the heat of battle, he was quite ready to let go of the frills of etiquette.
Patton harbored some unconventional views. He believed in reincarnation and was convinced he had seen battle in previous lives. There is no doubt that he expressed views that today we would consider racist, but again, bear in mind the age in which the man lived. He made antisemitic comments that are indefensible. There is also no question that he had an enormous ego, a narcissistic one at that; but we might ask, what sort of personality would you prefer in an effective general who will get the job done? This type of personality must often be accepted as part of the recipe of military success.
Aside from his invectives in battle, Patton understood that tanks, armor and fighting spirit were not enough. Underpinning all of this is the need for the moral quality to be ready to defend the ideas of freedom: “I find that moral courage is the most valuable and most usually absent characteristic,” he expressed in a private letter.
It’s not obvious that, right now, Patton has been reincarnated, but even if he’s not here, we can learn much from what the man stood for and what he fought for. At the very least, you can read his speeches for some blunt-edged unalloyed inspiration in our current time.
The views expressed in this opinion article are the author’s and not necessarily those of Kyiv Post.
Source: Charles Cockell