Paul Murphy

Dostoevsky sin Perro

Stay away from me half a dick. . . (Old Muscovite saying)


Welcome to Moscow we have many madmen
And, luckily, you might say are of former significance.
No one wants this city except for sitcom repros
Of the Classics. Remember Raskolnikov?
I am the doppelganger shadow, double, that sat
Up half the night in your room in your arms, wept.
Remember Mr Marmalade? I have his gilt-edged
Snot-picking knife and embroidered toupee,
His phial of cyanide. Remember Leon Trotsky?
He was reconstructed in our finest Hotel,
The Hotel Grace Kelly right beside the former hostel
Red Star. His mummy is dilapidated, everyone
Thinks it stinks, putrid, rank with memories, piss-stained
With the past, reeking of history. Dostoevsky sans perro
He said, 'I met many wild asses in Switzerland, many wild asses.
I was never interested in Winter sports, and the whores in
Sils-Maria were not amusing. I always headed to the gambling
Dens. For this I have sentenced the human race to decide
To love or hate my Crime and Punishment.'
Endless hashes of Russian madmen, vodka-breathed,
Like Visarrion, our Siberian Jesus, leering, epileptic, visionary.