Trafika Europe 13 - Russian Ballet

Naum Vaiman

achieved their fullness….” 1 In your youth, the death of another or the withering of nature only serve to underscore the triumphant force of your own life. And the rituals of love were particularly sweet to celebrate in the fall then: when you are kissing a girl, who has turned rosy-cheeked from the cold, and crackling under your feet are the desiccated sinews of the “crimson hearts” cast down from the branches, somewhere among the woodlands of the Fili or Sokolniki Parks. Autumn is the ritual of eternal recurrence. “And with each autumn, I flower anew...” Nature calms us down. So... did I become a melancholic since those days? I think not. But, I did come to cherish melancholy. The Ecclesiast decided to flatter the melancholic, on the matter of the heart of the wise being in the house of mourning (and “the heart of fools, in the house of mirth”). Yes, that is true, however, “pleasures” too possess their own wisdom. The happy live in the present moment, and the sad are ever peeking into the future or looking backwards into the past. But then again, dreaminess is not yet wisdom, rather, more than likely, it is fear before the prospect of daily life, which is akin to walking on the logs being floated down a river: each and every step represents a threat, the risk of falling into the chilly waters of Lethe. Also, the joyful ones

Yevgeny Baratynsky, “Autumn”

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