A NIGHT AT THE OPERA

All the torment and tenderness

Of the Russian soul,

All the vision behind melancholic eyes.

And the walls of Hell, look –

Four thousand miles thick;

And worms in the mouth;

And the chemist’s methyl poison

On the breath.

Mussorgsky,

Part-time composer,

Full-time alcoholic.

And full of heroic melancholy.

* * *

So take Boris the opera, and you decide –

Pageant or polemic?

The voice of Mother Russia herself,

Or the bleatings of a latter-day

Decembrist?

The false Dmitri sings, and

Weaves his way into treachery.

First accusation, then vicarious guilt,

Then the unquiet confession.

We know that Boris the Tsar,

Soul and split personality,

Must disintegrate before our ears,

Reduced to deep bass instincts.

* * *

Fuelled by illicit liquor

From Professor Borodin’s laboratory,

The composer lays down his pen.

Poor Russia,

Perma-frosted Russia,

Still hungry,

Still hungering after truth,

Still tasting

The bread of disappointment:

The curtain falls.

(Michael Newman) 18 Courtiers Drive, Bishops Cleeve, Cheltenham