Razmik Davoyan and Arminé Tamrazian in Conversation

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Razmik Davoyan

Translated from the Armenian by Arminé Tamrazian

Creation

I embrace the tree until

The bounds disappear

Between the tree and me

I carve the rock until

The bounds disappear

Between the rock and me

I carve the rock until

God appears

Between the rock and me.

I am Not Here Now

Pure and white as the full moon,

Placed upon the blue as the full moon,

Star roses flourishing in thousands of colours all around,

Around me collapsing waves of thoughts …

Before me the sea is blue,

And the table white,

Granules of salt sparkle without a care

And the fork scratches the plate

With its cold fingers.

I am not here now,

I am not here now —

I shall blow on myself now

And be scattered as a dandelion in the air.

Immaterial, painless like a ray of light,

As the flow of a stream through a small dyke

My mind carried me away unnoticed,

Away from my depths.

All around me star roses flourishing in thousands of colours,

All around me collapsing waves of thoughts,

A round table is placed before me

As a full moon,

I look on, I know,

And I am no more.

I wish to weep

But I feel

I shall bleat

From pain

Like a stray goat

But the pain is no more

Could a tear come to be,

Without a source or without pain?

I wish to weep

And I rustle,

I rustle as the dry leaves of autumn.

As …

Alas, the rustle of a drained heart.

Drained in your hands,

Drained by your hands —

Before the revelation of memories of ‘You’

I remain powerless, silent, bewildered.

And although I am sitting here now,

And the fork is scratching the plate

With its cold fingers

Yet, I am not here now,

I am not here now,

I shall blow on myself now

And disappear as a dandelion in the air.

(From Whispers and Breath of the Meadows. Todmorden: Arc Publications, 2010)

Notes

1 The Armenian Genocide, known to be the first genocide of the twentieth century, refers to the organised, systematic mass killings and deportation of Armenians from their historical homeland. In 1915 the Turkish government ordered the mass killings of able-bodied men and the deportation and murder of women, children and the older population of Armenians from Western Armenia (part of Turkey today), leading them on death marches into the Syrian desert and emptying the entire region of its native Armenian population, who had lived on that land for thousands of years. Over one and a half million Armenians perished as a result, leaving behind their property, homeland and huge wealth; and this also led to the formation of an Armenian diaspora in Syria, Lebanon and all over the world.