#yevtushenko - Hello Poetry

All Change at Zima Junction For Yevgeny Yevtushenko, 1932-2017 Everyone changes trains at Zima Junction Changes lives; nineteen becomes twenty-one With hardly a pause for twenty and then Everyone asks you questions you can’t answer And then they say you’ve changed, and ignore you The small-town brief-case politician still Enthroned as if she were a committee And asks you what are you doing back here And then you go away, on a different train: Everyone changes trains at Zima Junction “I went, and I am still going.”1 1Yevtuskenko: Selected Poems. Penguin,1962

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Apr 4, 2017

Apr 4, 2017 at 4:48 PM UTC

lawrence-hall

All Change at Zima Junction

All Change at Zima Junction For Yevgeny Yevtushenko, 1932-2017 Everyone changes trains at Zima Junction Changes lives; nineteen becomes twenty-one With hardly a pause for twenty and then Everyone asks you questions you can’t answer And then they say you’ve changed, and ignore you The small-town brief-case politician still Enthroned as if she were a committee And asks you what are you doing back here And then you go away, on a different train: Everyone changes trains at Zima Junction “I went, and I am still going.”1 1Yevtuskenko: Selected Poems. Penguin,1962

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But Yevtushenko... A tribute to Penguin paperbacks When they Someday Take us away For reading For thinking For writing Those Penguin paperbacks all tattered and taped Discovered when they empty our pockets Will Be used against us in their courts of law But Yevtushenko might corrupt our jailers

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Jul 17, 2019

Jul 17, 2019 at 3:54 PM UTC

lawrence-hall

But Yevtushenko Might Corrupt Our Jailers - a tribute to Penguin paperbacks

But Yevtushenko... A tribute to Penguin paperbacks When they Someday Take us away For reading For thinking For writing Those Penguin paperbacks all tattered and taped Discovered when they empty our pockets Will Be used against us in their courts of law But Yevtushenko might corrupt our jailers

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“The F_g with the Bow Tie” 1 “Only in Russia is poetry respected – it gets people killed. Is there anywhere else where poetry is so common a motive for ****** -Osip Mandelstam 2 Spain. Poetry got people killed in Spain - And still wherever tyrants of delicate nerves And artistic sensitivities hear Whispered rumors of whispered disapproval And so an innocent, fearful and trembling Must be motored away to a moonless death Upon orders spoken, written, tweeted Telephoned, telegraphed, or teletyped One prays he has a moment to adjust his tie Perfectly - as an honor to Poetry 1 The slur is attributed to Federico Garcia Lorca’s murderers: https://lithub.com/dictators-kill-poets-on-federico-garcia-lorcas-last-days/ 2 Quoted by Yevgeny Yevtushenko in 20th Century Russian Poetry*

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Mar 12, 2019

Mar 12, 2019 at 4:07 PM UTC

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"The F*g with the Bow Tie"

“The F_g with the Bow Tie” 1 “Only in Russia is poetry respected – it gets people killed. Is there anywhere else where poetry is so common a motive for ****** -Osip Mandelstam 2 Spain. Poetry got people killed in Spain - And still wherever tyrants of delicate nerves And artistic sensitivities hear Whispered rumors of whispered disapproval And so an innocent, fearful and trembling Must be motored away to a moonless death Upon orders spoken, written, tweeted Telephoned, telegraphed, or teletyped One prays he has a moment to adjust his tie Perfectly - as an honor to Poetry 1 The slur is attributed to Federico Garcia Lorca’s murderers: https://lithub.com/dictators-kill-poets-on-federico-garcia-lorcas-last-days/ 2 Quoted by Yevgeny Yevtushenko in 20th Century Russian Poetry*

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Lawrence Hall HSG [email protected] You are Going to Write a Poem Today A poet's words can outlive empires and shake the foundations of tyrants. -Yevtushenko You are going to write a poem today Although you will never finish it For the hours, or a person from Porlock Will lead you to pause your thought for a time Your poem will repose as a meditation A word upon the altar of your mind And even as you are distracted at Mass Your poem becomes a tiny sip of salvation All the truthing words that have come to you - There on your mindful altar they bless the world

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Jun 12, 2024

Jun 12, 2024 at 9:09 PM UTC

lawrence-hall

You are Going to Write a Poem Today

Lawrence Hall HSG [email protected] You are Going to Write a Poem Today A poet's words can outlive empires and shake the foundations of tyrants. -Yevtushenko You are going to write a poem today Although you will never finish it For the hours, or a person from Porlock Will lead you to pause your thought for a time Your poem will repose as a meditation A word upon the altar of your mind And even as you are distracted at Mass Your poem becomes a tiny sip of salvation All the truthing words that have come to you - There on your mindful altar they bless the world

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Lawrence Hall [email protected] https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/ poeticdrivel.blogspot.com Lines for Marina Tsvetaeva “Her poetry is…passion, pain, metaphor, and music.” - Yevgeny Yevtushenko Her words soar over utilitarians Past pale, pedantic propagandists who Would wrench all poetry into a cause As if verse were but a commodity Her picture on a Penguin paperback Embraces the viewer, stares back, dares back Her eyes defiant, her arms folded in hope Armored in her famous clunky jewelry She bleeds onto the page, into the soul Her words, suspended in truth against the age

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Oct 19, 2020

Oct 19, 2020 at 10:26 AM UTC

lawrence-hall

Lines for Marina Tsvetaeva

Lawrence Hall [email protected] https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/ poeticdrivel.blogspot.com Lines for Marina Tsvetaeva “Her poetry is…passion, pain, metaphor, and music.” - Yevgeny Yevtushenko Her words soar over utilitarians Past pale, pedantic propagandists who Would wrench all poetry into a cause As if verse were but a commodity Her picture on a Penguin paperback Embraces the viewer, stares back, dares back Her eyes defiant, her arms folded in hope Armored in her famous clunky jewelry She bleeds onto the page, into the soul Her words, suspended in truth against the age

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Lawrence Hall [email protected] https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/ poeticdrivel.blogspot.com My Bourgeois Leanings One day, at a meeting of the Komsomol…he was accused of bourgeois leanings just because he happened to wear a tie. -Yevtushenko, A Precocious Autobiography, recounting an anecdote by his father I am the only man who wears a tie With proper coat and trousers (inspection pass) Properly kitted like a proper guy To weddings, funerals, dinners, and Sunday Mass I am the only man who does not wear Sneakers or baseball caps, gas-station shades Knee pants, tee shirts, jeans with a built-in tear Or plastic jackets shaped like hand grenades If we are facing civilization’s end - One’s trousers touch one’s oxfords with a quarter-inch bend

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Jun 8, 2022

Jun 8, 2022 at 11:20 PM UTC

lawrence-hall

My Bourgeois Leanings

Lawrence Hall [email protected] https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/ poeticdrivel.blogspot.com My Bourgeois Leanings One day, at a meeting of the Komsomol…he was accused of bourgeois leanings just because he happened to wear a tie. -Yevtushenko, A Precocious Autobiography, recounting an anecdote by his father I am the only man who wears a tie With proper coat and trousers (inspection pass) Properly kitted like a proper guy To weddings, funerals, dinners, and Sunday Mass I am the only man who does not wear Sneakers or baseball caps, gas-station shades Knee pants, tee shirts, jeans with a built-in tear Or plastic jackets shaped like hand grenades If we are facing civilization’s end - One’s trousers touch one’s oxfords with a quarter-inch bend

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Lawrence Hall, HSG [email protected] The Wind Drove the Pages Wild Reading Yevtushenko on a Windy Day The flapping, fluttering pages went wild in the wind And poetry sometimes should go wild, blow wild To shake those gently slumbering words awake Provoking peaceful musings into a storm Nouns chasing verbs into logical conclusions That turn about and bite the reader in the (hand) And adjectives torment the symbolism While adverbs, as always, were mostly in the way I just wanted a quiet hour with coffee and verse But flapping, fluttering pages went wild in the wind

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Feb 22, 2024

Feb 22, 2024 at 8:45 PM UTC

lawrence-hall

The Wind Drove the Pages Wild

Lawrence Hall, HSG [email protected] The Wind Drove the Pages Wild Reading Yevtushenko on a Windy Day The flapping, fluttering pages went wild in the wind And poetry sometimes should go wild, blow wild To shake those gently slumbering words awake Provoking peaceful musings into a storm Nouns chasing verbs into logical conclusions That turn about and bite the reader in the (hand) And adjectives torment the symbolism While adverbs, as always, were mostly in the way I just wanted a quiet hour with coffee and verse But flapping, fluttering pages went wild in the wind

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