The Scythians

By Alexander Blok

Panmongolism. This word is wild,

But still my hearing it caresses,..”

- Vladimir Solovyev, Panmongolism

You're millions. But we: a legion, rabble.

Just try and challenge us to battle!

Yes, we're Scythians, and we're Asians.

And we have slanted hungry eyes!

To you - a century, to us - a single hour.

We, like the most obedient of serfs

Held up a shield between two hostile peoples -

The Mongols, and the ancient Europe!

For centuries and ages your old furnace

Both forged and drowned the avalanches' thunder,

And as an outrageous myth appeared to you

The falls of Lisbon and Messina!

For centuries you've peered into the East,

While storing, melting our pearls,

You jeered and waited for the time,

When you could point your cannons forth!

But here’s the hour. Disaster beats its wings,

And multiplies offenses day by day!

And so, there may just come a time

When all your Paestrums vanish by and by!

Oh, ancient world! While you’re still with us,

While still entrapped by luscious torments,

Do come, oh sage, as once did Oedipus,

Before the Sphinx’s own antique conundrum!

For Russia is the Sphinx. In sadness and in joy.

Or as it bathes itself in charcoal-colored blood,

It stares and stares into your soul,

At once with loathing and with love!

What’s more, the sort of love our spirit holds

For long's been slipping through your palms!

And you’ve forgotten that the world knows loves

Which light and ruin all at once.

We love it all - the gift of godly visions

And the cold heat of numbers,

We grasp it all - both dusky German genius,

And chiseled meanings of the Gauls ...

And we remember all - Venetian chills,

Recall the hells of Paris streets,

The distant odor of the lemon groves,

The smoky masses of Cologne.

We cherish flesh - its taste, its shades,

The damp and deathly fleshy smells...

Are we at fault if in our tender hard embrace,

Your skeleton should crack?

We're used, while grabbing under bridles

Of playful wild and zealous stallions,

To break them down, to break their backs,

And to subdue unruly slave girls.

Please come to us! From wartime horrors

Come find your peace in our embraces!

Your old sword sheathed, while there's still time...

Our comrades! We'll become as brothers!

But if you don't - we're chained to nothing,

We're open to perfidious ways!

For ages, ages - you'll be cursed

By future's sickly progenies!

We'll wander far and wide before

Your pretty Europe's woods and wilds!

And then we'll turn, just to face you

With our Asiatic mug!

Now walk you all, oh walk towards Urals!

We clear the landscape for a war

Between machines of steel, where breathes integral time,

And savage Mongol hordes!

But we can’t any longer be your shield

And shall not enter in your fight,

We'll merely watch the deadly violence boil

With calmness of our narrow eyes.

We'll stay unbothered even as the brutal Huns

Are fumbling through the pockets of your dead,

Are crowding church halls of your burning cities,

And frying our pale-skinned brothers' flesh!

I’ll say once more - come to your senses, oh old world;

And join fraternal feasts of peace and labor!

One final time, unto these bright fraternal feasts,

You're summoned by our savage lyre’s noise!

- 1918