THE BOOK OF POEMS IN TWENTIETH-CENTURY ... - TopReferat

And there, where the blind worm breaks its path,
It will die and germinate in its destined time.
So too does my soul go the way of the grain:
Having gone down into the darkness, it will die and be reborn.
And you, my country, and you, her people,
Will die and be reborn, having made your way through this year.
Since a single truth is given to us:
Every living thing must go the way of the grain.
Bethea rightly claims that this poem colors and organizes the final edition of Путем
зерна, creating a cyclical pattern for the rest of the lyrics to follow—a movement through
darkness and death to light and rebirth. The poems which come after "Путем зерна" are
characterized by doubt and uncertainty—they describe the darkness out of which the
grain will, in the end, be reborn in the final poem of the book, "Хлебы," a joyous
description of breadbaking. "From first to last Khodasevich seems to say that the seed
placed in soil has a purpose—it is to become the loaf that nourishes." 31
This poem did not, however, open the first two editions, but instead appeared late
in the book, in between the poems "Золото" and "2-ого ноября," a description of
revolutionary Moscow. Bethea briefly mentions this change of position in a footnote but
does not explore Khodasevich's reasons for making it other than to say that he apparently
felt that the poem served better as a frontispiece than "Ручей," the poem which originally
opened the book. In fact, Khodasevich's decision to open the book with "Путем зерна"
reflects a new conception of the entire book. 32
In the first two editions of Путем зерна,
31 Bethea, Khodasevich, 139. By showing that it is this general movement of the lyrics as opposed to strict
chronological ordering of the poems that defines the shape of Путем зерна, Bethea argues that the book is
deliberately composed by Khodasevich as a unified work of art. Ibid., 142.
32 Ibid., 138, n.66 Bethea also mentions the exclusion of several doubtful, anxious poems from the opening
pages of the book in the final edition. He suggests that Khodasevich may have removed them because they
were too close in manner to his earlier work, yet they, in Bethea's view, provide further evidence of the
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