SIBERIAN SONG

Was I the hunter who came down the valley's winding road

to thy door that icy night when the frost lay hard,

Glistening in the moon's windless kiss?

Were you thee who, sitting by thy fire that still evening,

heard my numb knocking?

And, on answering, heard a lame apology muttered into an untidy beard:

"I was passing through this valley

And chanced to see a candle burning in thy window" ...

You bade me enter and -unrecognized- I stumbled in,

awkwardly brushing off the hoar-frost, grateful to be

In thy warm cabin, smelling the pine needles scenting the logs

burning redly in thy fireplace.

Standing here, it seems so long ago now,

my wanderings through the taiga,

And the unending forests of Kamchatka;

countless days the journey,

Hearing in the pine's sweeping whisper

the splendour of thy name.

Those pitch-black nights with only the wolves for company

and blind faith in the guiding-star above,

Travelling the rapids of many rivers,

chilled to the bone -so cold, the soul

Would crack and be lost in swirling icefloes ...

thus I made my way through these lands,

Alone.

Now it seems so many moons ago

when first I saw thy lighted window

Glowing from afar -so faint that, in the misty dawn,

I may have blinked,

Mistaking its shining promise for another's guiding star.

Much time ago now -yes, beyond the world's beginning-

when first I set foot upon this Clear Land

By the green forests and the bubbling shallows of the river Amur.

That evening, when I heard thy sweet song

Echo in the valley; when I saw thee bathing there,

the sun's last rays playing on the violet foothills

Of distant mountains ...

Now but a trick of the mind -returning to thy arms-

there to be lost in endless joys!

Then! O, then! I brought thee furs and fine things

from wondrous places!

Siberian gold and amethyst, silk from China;

fabulous tales from ancient Samarkand

And wild stories of the Kamchatka;

amber from the Baltic coasts

And the undying wisdom of Himalaya!

Then! O, then! We were lost in such dreams!

But, today, what have I for thee?

Only my old fur hat -once the pelt

Of an unmourned bear- which you don so prettily now,

so innocently beautiful that my heart burst with adoration.

Yet, what art thou but a fleeting dream of many pasts?

Having lived many another time,

Hearing many another song,

what is this strange melody I hear now in unseen skies?

Empty-handed, what may I offer thee?

Every gift wished away recklessly in a thousand brawling taverns,

My soul trodden under their dirty soil? What may I offer thee

but wild-eyed reveries and misremembered memories

Still unredeeemed?

What right do I have to stand in thy door,

unsure in sense of place,

Yet drawn here to proclaim, flatly, my existence

as if it matters that much now,

My mind lost in many pasts, floating like so many felled

logs to the ocean?

Sitting by thy fire, o golden one, I sought

answers in thy numbed heart

And feigned surprise, not finding any.

Tongue-tied, dry-mouth'd heart-shackl'd,

I wondered how brief was this respite

before the weary journey and the searching must go on.

We sat like this, deep into the night,

until you yawned and felt sleep approach thee.

Knowing that the time had come again

I thanked thee and bade farewell.

Then -before facing my wilderness home- I kissed thee awkwardly,

as one might shyly kiss one's first love ...

RW, first draft, 29.XII.84, latest draft, 15.XII.92.

Copyright, Rory Winter 2013