Diplomatic Agent by Lev Vershinin, а перевел

Diplomatic Agent
(by Lev Vershinin)

       
1.
… Flames of the candles tremble,
The waves of the shadows track.
The big portrait of The Monarch
Is behind the Counselor’s back.
Like serpents are twisted aglets,
Dim thread of the shoulder-plate …
- Lieutenant Ivan Vitkevich
Has honor reporting …

…Yet,
to speak of it all - not simple,
but say less than all - in vain …

- With the Afghan emir Dost Bakrazai
I have spoken again and again.
Not for the first time Britannia
Is fixing a bridge to Kabul …
Dost asked to be a Russian subject.
Mind you, Count,
                his commitment is full.
I spoke with him like with you:
He prayed - his right hand on the
                hilt -
That we come and safe the green banner
Shield it with the Russian
                shield.

Unbuttoned lock of the tablet
Hammered copper shines …

- I ask you - these very papers
Be given attention at once!

The notebooks don’t make a sound,
But melting between the lines
                are
Lean minarets and the roar
Of the eastern roads
                afar,
Karnay’s roar dreary,
Bonfires above clouds in the sky,
Azure of the tiles of Khiva,
Bay brick of the old Bukhara...


But – thoroughly groomed, non-broudy,
With a smile like a lifeless rat,
Nocks Count Nesselrode
His stately powdered head.

- The East does not interest Russia!
I will not accept your report.
Destroying friendship with Britan
The Empire does not condone.
Even one more problem now 
Would be overwhelming for
                us.
We’ve plenty to do in Poland.
And – there is
               Caucasus.
We did not sow in Kabul,
Not by us the yield should be
                ripped.
I shall not keep you any further.
Take your scribbles and go …
                Dismissed!

2.
Pepered with the last snow,
Granite lions are getting the
                freez*zze ...
The lieutenant at the parapet
Stares at the Neva-river
                streams.
Resemble a cleaved piece of mica
April waters, so smooth, so
                glee …
How strange after The East -
Such abundance of water
                - a sea …
The Count’s eyes are dead empty
Overbearing like tarpits of gloom.
The East does not interest Russia?
Says who? I can prove him a fool!
Of quicksand’s canning influxes,
Worlds unknown stretching further afar,
Azure of the tiles of Khiva,
Bay brick of the old Bukhara...

“Come now, Count Nesselrode:
To Amu, lean, slender and tan,
Sipai platoons are pulling
The Manchester’s artillery train.
Even through mountains mudflows,
And even through blizzards of hail,
Journey from Kushka to Orenburg
Takes only thirteen weeks… Oh Hell!
Our land is not little. Given!
It may seem no trouble
                there
To move back our borders to Urals …
But where move them yet further?
                Where?”


3.
Along icy streets in the glear
Of lanterns that don’t shine very far
Wanders Lieutenant Vitkevich
That drunk tea in old Bukhara.

Overcoat is thin. He trembles.
Steam hangs over his bushy mustache.
Rare folks that he spooked, they remember,
Brutal tan on his face. - Not potash!

The St. Petersburg’s frost is biting
The lieutenant’s wet lips at the
                ends …
“The East does not interest Russia!
With Britannia you are the best
                friends?!
It turns out, I was slaving for s_o_m_e_o_n_e
When kept scribbling in sands until
                down
Maps, reports, roads, routs, Eastern
Dictionaries that nowhere
                be found.
Uniforms so shiny, so glamorous …
Office desks spread as wide as The East …
There I was the Russia's Czar’s Agent!
Here?
“… shall not keep you any further … dismissed!”

Look, Count!
            The Sovereign’s Counselor!
You should come understand one
                thing:
It is either Russia or Britain!
No options but these to
                redeem …



4.
In the narrow bed lays all restless
(With the bottle of vodka half done)
Lieutenant Ivan Vitkevich
That lived for a year in Kokand.

In the room hangs the heavy spirit, and
Lay all over the desk and the stool
Useless heaps of the well-traveled papers -
Khiva, Bukhara, Kabul.

And twisted as a dead in a shroud
In the coals their leaves are burning hot …
Come on, who needs all of them, now?
Kunduz, Kandahar, Herat?!

But – they scream their screams from the fire,
But – mortally wounded
                leaves
Of the roads through the deserts
And old dry water-tunnels’
                twists,
Tents of the Pushtun war-chieftains,
Wells midst the sands
                stretching far,
Azure of the tiles of Khiva,
Bay brick of the old Bukhara...

He mastered half a bottle,
But there is no
               relief …..
“The East does not interest Russia?
Forgive me, what nonsense!
                - Good grief!


Count, think using logic:
As we only take one
                back-step
That would make all the Russian World crumble
And would turn Russian word in the
                crap.
Our glory will fall like dust-pieces,
Our state - burn away in the
                fire …
We'll surrender Riga and Vilna,
And Revel will turn into
                Tallinn.
Kaysaks will go burning line posts,
Chechens will sack Grozny
                to make
Europe applaud their freedom
And British to dance at our
                wake.”

The glittery smile is grinning,
And the ears of noises are full ...
“Oh, Count, correct the error!
I will go at once to Kabul.”

Trembles their green banner
Not hidden behind our shield …
They now seek our protection
By themselves.
    We shall give it.
                Why yeld?

5.
… The British embassy – candles.
The chief-servant’s significant face.
Evening party has ended,
                it's over.
Just the chosen circle remains.
Whist bets
          high
              and go on doubling.
Game is played
              by
                the sly
                and the mad:
Ambassador of the Greatest Empire and
Count, the Russian Ministry’s head.


Русский текст стихотворения " " Льва Вершинина по ссылке
https://yarin-mikhail.livejournal.com/112613.html