M.Tsvetaeva, One Of My Ancestors Was... - Translation (Rus.) Poem by Lyudmila Purgina

One of my ancestors was - surely a fiddler,
A rider and a thief, as well.
So my temper is of a vagrant kind, indeed,
And with a wind my hair smells.

Lo, isn't it he, swarthy, who's stealing something from arba
(* arba is name of the bullock cart in muslim countries)
With my hand - the apricots,
He is guilty for my passionate destiny, rather,
Curly-haired and hook-nosed!

And marveling at ploughman with wooden plough,
He circled in his lips - a dog rose.
He was the bad friend, - but the valiant
And the tender lover though.

He was the amateur of tobacco pipe,
Of moon and beads, and the girls-neighbours...
And also I think, that he was - coward,
My ancestor with eyes so yellow.

That, having sold his soul to the evil
For only cent, he didn't like the graveyard!
And I think, that a knife he carried
Just under top of boot for safety.

That he for many times had jumped
From corners - at a cat - so lissom...
I catched the thought, that he, at last,
Can't be - a master-fiddler!

And nothing could then embarass him,
As in summer - the last-year snow!
So - such as this old folk was a violinist,
I became at least - a poet!

23 june 1915