SCANDALIST

What has remained joyful to me, is to put the finger

in the mouth and whistle cheerfully.

I'm preceded by a bad reputation:

that I'm vulgar and scandalous.

Alas, what a ridiculous loss!

In a lifetime there are many ridiculous losses.

I'm embarrassed that I believed in God.

Beg for me that I will believe no more.

Golden, longer distance!

All burned by everyday life.

I was vulgar and scandalous.

For the purpose of glowing more.

Music: Maria Marachowska 2007

Text: Sergeij Jessenin

Translation: Iris Weirich 2010 

SONNET CXLIV. (144)

Two loves I have of comfort and despair,
Which like two spirits do suggest me still: 
The better angel is a man right fair,
The worser spirit a woman colour'd ill.
To win me soon to hell, my female evil
Tempteth my better angel from my side,
And would corrupt my saint to be a devil,
Wooing his purity with her foul pride.
And whether that my angel be turn'd fiend
Suspect I may, but not directly tell;
But being both from me, both to each friend,
I guess one angel in another's hell:
Yet this shall I ne'er know, but live in doubt,
Till my bad angel fire my good one out.

Music: Maria Marachowska 2009

Lyrics: William Shakespeare 1609

SONGS

Songs, songs, what do you scream 
and scream again?
Or: Have you nothing left to give?
The fair, the light blue yarn
I learn how to braid it into hair, into time.

I want to be strict, I learn about silence,
learn from the stars how to be silent and good.
Good: as a bush on the wayside, 
as a willow tending the slumbering Russia.

Good: in the moon, in the autumn of September strolling alone trough the grass yellow as the moon, gathering the dry ears of corn along 
the path into the soul's empty lumber bag.

However, it's not the blue of the plains 
that heals me.
Songs, songs, what do you pin on me?
With a gold sparkling broom the evening cleans 
the path and sweeps it smooth for me.

And so delightful above the woods
sounds the call that fades in the wind:
"You, who lives, be gentle, be cold
like the autumn gold of the lime-trees“.

Music: Maria Marachowska 2007 
Lyrics: Sergej Jessenin 1918 
Translation: Iris Weirich 2010

MYSTERY GOD 

I - am God of a mysterious world. 
The whole world lies in my dreams.
I would never create an idol for me, 
neither on the earth nor in heaven. 

My divine nature
I do not reveal to anyone.
I struggle like a slave, and for freedom 
I call for nighttime peace and darkness.

Music: Maria Marachowska 2010
Lyrics: Fedor Sologub 1896
Translation: Iris Weirich 2010

EARTH

The winds do not blow in vain.

The tempest did not occur without a reason.

A mysterious person has watered my eyes

with silent light.

Touched by external tenderness,

I mourned in the blue haze.

About the beautiful, but not the earthly

of the world not unravelled yet.

I am not depressed by the deaf milky way,

not disturbed by the fear of stars.

I used to love the world and eternity.

Like the parents' hearth.

All about them gracious and holy.

Inquietude is bright.

The poppy coloured sunset sparkling

on the lake's glassy surface.

And in the sea of bread, of ears of corn,

a holy image erupting from my tongue.

The heavens are calving,

licking the red calve.

Music: Maria Marachowska 2006

Text: Sergeij Jessenin, 1918

Translation: Iris Weirich 2010

FRIEND

See you later, friend mine, see you later.
Darling, you are always in my soul.
Destined in the heaven, our break up
Promises reunion down the road.

Bye with not a hand touch, not a farewell,
Don’t lament, quit saddening your eyes, –
In this province, death is nothing rare. Well,
Nor is living any more untried.

Music: Maria Marachowska 2012
Lyrics: Sergej Esennin 1925
English translation: V.Chetin 2011