Mind Over Matter. 72 assorted poems in English by a Russian

    2000
Too many people close about
Make a crowd.
Moscow’s endowed with it, no doubt:
We abound,
We are all around
Whom have we found?
No one to be the One,
No sooth to be the Truth,
No win worth having won,
No fighting nail and tooth.

Too many people, not too many friends —
A common big places’ notable trend,
To lonely homes the way to wend,
Away from small places, from which we were rent.

Too many things that are currently on —
The shows – why not – might indeed go on
So all our talks are of shows we’ve seen
And just city places, to which we have been.
You write to your province friends of this waterspout
But there’s nothing you feel worth writing about —
To them, that all is city talk,
Which we ill-strenuously balk.

Too many people close about
No place to stay out
You are alone
But not quite your own
You are quite single
But you have to mingle…
Time gets by —
Hard to ask it why —
And you are just a slice
Of one big apple-pie.

Too many people for so few places
Homes to mad and futile races
For better and better stuff and gadgets to have
But everyone needs somebody to love.

Too many people close about
Make a crowd
But no-one’s as close to thee
As you would want him to be.
We abound,
We are all around —
Whom have we found?

    2005
Lots of people, little space:
One hot dirty endless race,
One for pleasure, leisure, place,
One immeasurable craze.

Lots of people, little space:
All big cities are a race…
One must really be small
To fit in it with us all

    2007
ComPunication

We are some of the first of those
Who have had their first nice dose
Of computerized communication:
A dose of comPunication.
Why meet
If you can have your seat
In your place
While I can in mine
And still communicate?
There’s the web, the phone, the personal page,
The social network, there’s all the rage
So let’s comPuniCage!
It’s neat
For you can have your seat
In your nameless city
And I can in mine
Grab the keyboard, hit it!
Sorry, my e-friend, I didn’t know
That you by this time have grown so old
I haven’t logged out for twenty-five years
I’ve always been near, e-near.
But then again…
Why meet
If you can get old in your place
And I can in mine
And still get old, get old, get old
Non-e-old…
Undo! Undo! Undo the changes!

    2008
If in a place of many
You don’t have a penny
The many around you won’t probably help:
Life ain’t so sunny
Where everyone’s running