Score on special sale from the Hire Library

While writing this I have before me an untitled poem by Osip Mandelstam (‘number 78’, inscribed Crimea, 1915) from his collection Kamen (Stone).  

In the opening lines the narrator cannot sleep.  As he reads, the suspended state of insomnia is lithely mingled with the image of a fleet of ships suspended mid-voyage, resembling a herd of cranes in flight.

Sleeplessness. Homer. Sails tense.

I have read the list of ships to the middle:

This long train, this brood of cranes

That once rose over Hellas.

Contrary to this graceful and lingering picture, the poem closes thunderously: with the roars and recitations of the encroaching sea.   This arresting final image perhaps alludes to the ancient affinities between music, word and thought. Bridging both ends of the poem is the notion that all things are impelled by a kinship, or love. 

My heartfelt thanks to Rachel Polonsky for creating a new translation of Mandelstam’s poem for this occasion.

Lisa Illean