I first read about Babi Yar in high school, about the
same time I first heard some of Yevgeny Yevtushenko’s poems. It was a novel
notion to me that some guy, in the Soviet Union, long before Glasnost, could be
a poet. You know, like Ferlinghetti
or Ginsburg or Plath.
I had pretty limited notions of both poets and current
events back then. I lived in the suburbs.
When I finally got interested in poetry, one of the first
books I bought was one of his collections. I don’t now recall which one, or any
of the poems in it; so it didn’t have a lasting effect on me. It was probably a
“Hey-I’m-sophisticated-I’m-reading-a-Soviet-poet” kind of statement.
Much later, I picked up a copy of Anatoly Kuznetsov’s Babi Yar at a used book shop. And at
that time I had no bleeding idea of what I was getting myself into—the book
cover was extremely sparse in the summarizing blurb department. I just knew it
was a novel about a massacre of Jews by the Nazis that took place in Kiev in
1941.
Much later still, when I finally got around to cracking
it open to read, a steady tide of horror and disbelief rose over me until I
nearly drowned. It turns out that Kutznetsov’s book is a “documentary novel” of
his experience witnessing the two-day bloodbath in which nearly 34,000 men,
women and children were murdered and shoved layer upon layer into the ravine called
Babi Yar.
Kuznetsov says, “"Let me emphasize again that I have
not told about anything exceptional, but only about ordinary things that were
part of a system; things that happened just yesterday, historically speaking,
when people were exactly as they are today."
Yevtushenko also wrote about the atrocity; it’s one of
his most famous works. Like Kuznetsov’s, his account is searing. But he uses
the poem to point out that the Soviet state is not much of an improvement on
the Nazis, and to denounce anti-Semitism in any garb. It was a pretty ballsy
move back in 1961, when it was first published.
And I don’t need to make any connection for you between
his “Union of the Russian People” and current events. History, baby—if you miss
it once, it comes around again.
Babi Yar
No
monument stands over Babi Yar.
A
steep cliff only, like the rudest headstone.
I
am afraid.
Today,
I am as old
As
the entire Jewish race itself.
I
see myself an ancient Israelite.
I
wander o'er the roads of ancient Egypt
And
here, upon the cross, I perish, tortured
And
even now, I bear the marks of nails.
It
seems to me that Dreyfus is myself.
The
Philistines betrayed me - and now judge.
I'm
in a cage. Surrounded and trapped,
I'm
persecuted, spat on, slandered, and
The
dainty dollies in their Brussels frills
Squeal,
as they stab umbrellas at my face.
I
see myself a boy in Belostok
Blood
spills, and runs upon the floors,
The
chiefs of bar and pub rage unimpeded
And
reek of vodka and of onion, half and half.
I'm
thrown back by a boot, I have no strength left,
In
vain I beg the rabble of pogrom,
To
jeers of "Kill the Jews, and save our Russia!"
My
mother's being beaten by a clerk.
O,
Russia of my heart, I know that you
Are
international, by inner nature.
But
often those whose hands are steeped in filth
Abused
your purest name, in name of hatred.
I
know the kindness of my native land.
How
vile, that without the slightest quiver
The
anti-Semites have proclaimed themselves
The
"Union of the Russian People!"
It
seems to me that I am Anna Frank,
Transparent,
as the thinnest branch in April,
And
I'm in love, and have no need of phrases,
But
only that we gaze into each other's eyes.
How
little one can see, or even sense!
Leaves
are forbidden, so is sky,
But
much is still allowed - very gently
In
darkened rooms each other to embrace.
-"They
come!"
-"No,
fear not - those are sounds
Of
spring itself. She's coming soon.
Quickly,
your lips!"
-"They
break the door!"
-"No,
river ice is breaking..."
Wild
grasses rustle over Babi Yar,
The
trees look sternly, as if passing judgment.
Here,
silently, all screams, and, hat in hand,
I
feel my hair changing shade to gray.
And
I myself, like one long soundless scream
Above
the thousands of thousands interred,
I'm
every old man executed here,
As
I am every child murdered here.
No
fiber of my body will forget this.
May
"Internationale" thunder and ring
When,
for all time, is buried and forgotten
The
last of anti-Semites on this earth.
There
is no Jewish blood that's blood of mine,
But,
hated with a passion that's corrosive
Am
I by anti-Semites like a Jew.
And
that is why I call myself a Russian!
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