The State

by M. A. Voloshin (1877-1932)
 

           1

  From the totality
  Of excesses, haste,
  Machinery and greed
  Arose the state.
The state stood for a fortress, sword,
Law and agreement.  The state
  Became the center
Of ill-managed, widespread evil:
A giant armored stomach,
In which the people function
As bacteria by helping the digestion. Here
Everything is built on use and profit,
  On the survival of self-seekers,
  On power.
Its moral code is healthy egoism.
The reason for existence is the digestive process.
The culture's standard is the cleanliness
Of toilets and storage of excretions.

           2

  The most ancient
 Of the state's prerogatives
Is that of blood production.
The judge, who acts in the capacity of Cain,
Is faultless and untouchable.
A killer without license is not a felon
  But a competitor:
He merits no mercy.
Small hand-made industries have no place
Within monopolized economy.

           3

  Of all the violence,
That man inflicts on others,
  Murder is the mildest,
  The cruelest is a child's upbringing.
  The rulers can't
Kill their heirs, yet each one
Tries to somehow cripple their lives:
There is a willful seed in every child
  That must be
  Checked in time.
  The reason for upbringing
Is self-defense of the adults
Against their children.
Thus, in the rear of a row of hangmen
  Walks a well-trained Committee
  Of comprachicos*
  Skilled in the production
  Of disinfected
  And castrated citizens.

           4

State treasury is plunder, while property is theft,
  But theft is, after all,
  The only legal means of acquisition.
        The state
  Has the monopoly
  Over the production
  Of counterfeit money.
  A head etched on a coin
And a country's coat of arms, appearing
On a bank note, like fingerprints
Identify the criminals.
  Only the hands
Of robbers are quite deep
To hold on to the loot.
  Thieves,
Thugs and hoodlums--only they
  Merit the title
  Of the progenitors
  Of ruling dynasties
And the grantors of familial estates.

           5

  But in our days, when it's required
Universally, equally, secretly, and directly
  To vote for the one that's worthy--
  There's one criterion
  That's used in the election:
  The candidate's ability
  To defame another
  And to prove
His own talent for deceit and crime.
And, for this reason, the head of parliament
Turns out to be the most shameless
And the most lawyerlike of all.
For politics is a dirty occupation--
  It calls for people
  That are practical
  And not squeamish about
  Blood or trading in
  Cadavers or buying up
  Raw sewage...
But the electors still believe
That out of three hundred scumbags
A just and honest government
Can be built.

           6

Amidst all truths there is one single truth
That's standard and universally accepted.
  From someone's dirty linen
  It's obtained
Under the state's strict supervision
  To satisfy all uses,
  Tastes and brains.
It's often served with coffee
On the freshly printed pages,
Or hurriedly gulped down in a streetcar,
And everyone who takes his morning dose
The whole day gives voice to his convictions,
  Views and political opinions:
     Loves to debate,
To shout in assemblies and to vote.
Of all the state's creations,
Like alcohol, like syphilis, like opium,
Patriotism, matches and tobacco,--
Of all the drugs that have received its patent
  The newspaper
Is the most lethal poison
That brings in most profits.

           7

Within a normal state there are
Two classes that stand outside the law:
  The criminals
  And the rulers.
In times of revolutions
They switch places,
  Which
Really makes no difference.
  But each side,
Having seized power, begins to recognize
Its sphere of authority
And so abuses its right to plunder,
Violence, propaganda and execution.
In order to transform the bloody brew
Of civil wars, reprisals, lynchings
Into a distillate of fair trials
The revolutionary government is forced
  To offset with terror
  The debts of killers.
  Thus, shaking up the classes,
  The revolution
Consolidates the state:
  With every
Spasm of mutiny, tried by the masses,
A metal collar of the state's garrote
Is tightening around a rebel's neck.
Obedience, espionage, black lists,
Informers, censors, terror--
  That's what the genius
  Of revolution gains!

                                     Koktebel, April 13, 1922
 

                                    --translated by Alexander Shaumyan

_____
*NOTE: Comprachicos (or child buyers) are described in Victor Hugo’s novel L’Homme
qui rit (“The Man Who Laughs”, 1869):
“The comprachicos (child buyers) were strange and hideous nomads in  the 17th
century. They made children into sideshow freaks. To succeed in producing a freak
one must get hold of him early; a dwarf must be started when he is small. They stunted
growth, they mangled features. It was an art/science of inverted orthopedics. Where
nature had put a straight glance, this art put a squint. Where nature had put harmony,
they put deformity and imperfection. The child was not aware of the mutilation he had
suffered. This horrible surgery left traces on his face, not in his mind. During the operation
the little patient was unconscious by means of a stupefying magic powder.”