The Tartar from the Kremlin

Translated from French by Marilyn Hacker


This particular Tartar doesn’t have four dromedaries for traveling
That’s what he usually says                              Not without a touch of irony
—it’s annoying to repeat yourself
Justify your immobility
Give all sorts of explanations
No one asks for them 
Isn’t it the survival of some sort of atavism?
 
Nomadism is an art           a camel is indispensable
 
**

The Tartars know something about it 
What they recount was classed as a world heritage
But they’re not the only ones to have
Made use of a scholarly poetry on the question 
 
And oases for thirst as the saying goes
Property of the picturesque nomad
The affirmation is categorical 
 
Scathing cutting all discussion short 

**

This particular Tartar doesn’t leave                                 that is to say never leaves
                                   the enclosure of the Kremlin
High walls pulled down now since June
Trenches filled in gigantic peripheral highways
Places for not-so-weekly markets
 
Not very talented                                 maybe a mask
Strategy of representation
Poison of urban phantasmagoria 
A character wrung out like a dishrag
 
It’s not amusing
Not dramatic either 
 
He daydreams in his garret of unveiling the mysteries of magnificent cities
 
Illumination
 
**

The briefest departure                                  as soon as it’s imagined
Which is rare                                               turns out to be a Chinese puzzle
He’s got to think about it at length             very lengthily indeed
To mope    to dissect  to gnaw away at it    to howl at the crows
In order to rouse himself
 
How do you decide to leave?
 
It’s complicated                                         it requires loads of energy
Contrary to preconceived ideas
Or received ones
 
That cast shadows on the wall behind the dump
 
**

He’s constantly preparing detailed itineraries
Drawn down to the millimeter
With a Prussian staff officer’s precision 
For minutiae he has                           a compass in his eye
Despite his genetic stain
 
He works on it nonstop                   for weeks
 
Suddenly just like that presto subito
Realizes that he doesn’t have the means to do this or
Another extravagant destination occurs to him
And then                            what good is it all?
Finished!  Trashcan!
 
What a pity
 
**

Going down the road to bargain-hunt at the Villejuif fleamarket or have a look
At the Canon at Gobelins that’s an expedition
Adventure!
A real one              there where they shiver in bomb-craters
 
The famous voyages of Sindbad the Sailor on the Indian Ocean or the Coral Sea, that he devours greedily in the Galland translation (especially the prints that he acquired under the counter) are no great thing. Ordinary Sunday strolls, rubbish, compared to the slightest displacement he’s obliged to make out of his village.

That’s something serious!
 
Like hearing the moans at dawn
                                             fifty leagues off, of Behemoths in heat 
Nothing to do with meaningless roadside rustlings 
 
**

It’s not that he’s cowardly like those Uighurs of the second
Or even the third generation and after
Those arrogant bastards don’t ever dare decamp from their seedy ghetto
Where they terrorize old ladies on the staircase landing!
Troublesome delinquents! Drug dealers!
Part-time swindlers and pyromaniacs!
 
And you, mate, you don’t like the Uighurs much
 
No one can stand the Uighurs!
It’s an open wound 
 
**

Not a loafer like those Merovingian kings
Who, the new schoolbooks affirm,
Would travel sluggishly supine in ox-carts
 
Ambulant jellies obstructing the roadways 
The palace mayors                                      fortunately they were around 
Put up with the job 
 
No, certainly not 
 
He wasn’t indecisive either
Don’t trust appearances 
 
**

The Tartars obstinate enterprising people
Who don’t give in easily 
Calloused hands agile minds in an era where
Ploughs / feathers don’t mean a thing
Defying maledictions all day long and daily
Demoralized and downcast for ages
 
Accursed crow so white and beautiful O God
Turned swarthy for having disobeyed deliberately or
Just mistaken a bag of lice for a bag of gold 
 
A regrettable incident            it only happens to people like us
Or we would have ended up like this
But we ended up like this
 
In the same satchel as the Uighurs
 
**

But none of this concerns him
 
His almost-official lodging on the outskirts of Bicêtre
A small government flat as he’s a veteran
Taught him 
While forgetting proverbs the steel of the tribe
To temper his nomad ancestry
 
To park his suitcases on the parquet
 
A dream the soldier cherishes while marching
Easier to say than to do           but it’s done
 
An unchanging existence doesn’t kill you really
You taste things differently diminishing            like soap
 
**

To draw a line through his past
                                                    —he’d like to write
his memoirs
                                                    One foot in the grave
 
The hope of a conversation with himself
Getting rid of his illusions 
Finding the words to say who he is
 
It brings a kind of lightness
 
No moodiness       or extravagance
 
He’d been able to attempt the impossible                  Win that great victory 

**

Into the closet with his bellicose instincts his morbid frenzy his unsatisfied sexual appetites his trashy primitive nostalgia to peacefully cultivate a sparse rocky patch of land 

(above all prefers pampering a tomato plant he brought back from Toulon with lettuces sorrel and wild thyme)
 
won without cheating 
memorable Tarot reading
they still talk about it today
profusion of savory details
witticisms you had to admire
that card game at the Café de la Mairie
 
**

This particular Tartar is unbeatable at cards
Except for whist (not a game for Tartars)
Which permits him to make ends meet
Sometimes throw a party, a feast
Where all the neighborhood enjoys his largesse
 
Well-planned banquets, a sophisticated mise en scène
Remembered for a certain decorum
 
Generosity in the blood secular recommendations
What he says so as not to be labeled a brainless spender
And maybe he believes it
Everyone’s there to receive the manna
Celebrate the donor
Shouting his slogan: I sow gold . . . 
 
We’re not likely to see such days again soon 
 
**

There’s always a glistening pigeon            favorable circumstances 
Newly arrived in the neighborhood
                                                         the bird
lets himself be plucked
without a fuss                                  Satisfied, even
 
The game takes place according to the rules
A good-natured politeness
Nothing to be said                           No regrets
no unseemly protests 
 
Everyone sympathizes  /  calm  /  the sucker
holds the spittoon while they tot up the score
 
In such a situation you can lose with style
Not lose face