--- L E V   R U B I N S H T E I N

                                  --translation of Lev Rubinshtein by Philip Metres and Tanya Tulchinsky

1

You could engage in something;

2

You could engage in establishing conceptual unity and spend almost all
your time on it; 

3

You could engage in establishing cause-and-effect connections and forget
about everything else; 

4

You could engage in mediating between a leader and follower and not know
what outcome would be positive; 

5

You could engage in classifying possibilities from the viewpoint of their
level of humor; 

6

You could engage in classifying passions from the viewpoint of how serious
the consequences; 

7

You could engage in classifying words from the viewpoint of their
contextual meaning; 

8

You could engage in classifying deeds from the viewpoint of their
contextual motivation; 

9

You could engage in classifying conditions from the viewpoint of their
vagueness; 

10

You could engage in classifying events from the viewpoint of their likely
outcome; 

11

You could engage in classifying positions from the viewpoint of their
hopelessness; 

12

You could engage in classifying doubts from the viewpoint of their
difficulty of dispelling; 

13

You could eliminate any doubts, just by finding the powerful
rhythm-building catalyst of existence--but in that would be all the difficulty; 

14

You could engage in some other task, not delving excessively into its
details; 

15

You could begin from whatever you wanted, being of the belief that
whatever beginning in a given situation will be rife with possibility; 

16

You could absolutize a minute weakness, elevating it to the role of a
constructive principle; 

17

You could bring any feeling-for example, wariness-to, let's say, cosmic
proportions; 

18

You could use all the rights you happen to be granted, not resorting to
their proclamation; 

19

You could teach a lesson of great patience, and in such a way that no one
would even sense it; 

20

You could bum around the border between self-mystification and
self-exposure and reflect awhile before the forbidden zone; 

21

You could stop before the forbidden zone in order to think about the
so-called consequences; 

22

You could stop before the necessity of choosing, or you could break the
threshold of an imaginary necessity; 

23

You could get ahead of events, but you cannot predict them; 

24

You could foresee every little detail, or you may just as well decide not
to; 

25

You could wander in thickets of emotional experiences, finding your way by
fictive signs and ideas alone; 

26

You could wander in a conceptual forest, not caring at all about the true
goal of the trip; 

27

You could perceive the mechanisms of different phenomena and not let
anyone know about it; 

28

You could believe the opposite of what you preach, or you could do
otherwise, without risking being exposed; 

29

You could successfully mistake one for the other and be delighted in your
discovery, not risking falling into error; 

30

You could successfully exchange one for the other, not risking falling
into ethical heresy; 

31

You could live on the energy of hidden yearning quite successfully; 

32

You could look nowhere, but see everything;

33

You could see everything, but understand nothing;

34

You could see everything and understand everything;

35

You could pay attention to nothing at all, or on the contrary, pay
attention to everything; you could pay attention to what seems the most
meaningful; 

36

You could see yourself in a dream, as if from the outside, in a most
unsightly role and wake from embarrassment and shame--but that's a private
matter; 

37

You could see yourself from the outside and be horrified, or you could be
happy about it; 

38

You could run from certain meetings, glances, conversations etc., but
isn't it much better to just confront your fate; 

39

You could almost mechanically construct mythological situations;

40

You could find yourself in a more than embarrassing position;

41

You could find yourself in the neighborhood and stop by to drink tea and chat;

42

You could chat about anything you like, and as long as you like, being
interested in the texture of speech alone; 

43

You could spend time enjoyably without any risk of growing tired of each
other--but you have to know how; 

44

You could try to frighten each other with the most ominous half-hints,
with only the opposite result; 

45

You could scrutinize each other with such wariness that it could become
quite a captivating game; 

46

You could speak for hours about the very same thing, not feeling sated-but
it would be difficult; 

47

You could talk about nothing for hours, and then say goodbye as if nothing
happened; 

48

You could end forever a conversation just begun, then see wait and see
what will come of it; 

49

You could believe that certain questions will always remain unsolved; 

50

You could complicate everything, or you may just as well simplify
everything to such a degree that there'd be just nothing left to talk
about; 

51

You could mystify to such a degree that the very possibility of
demystification begins to seem definitely illusory; 

52

You could get tired of each other to such a degree that the possibility of
new, unseen incentives for communication will emerge; 

53

You could manage completely without immediate help from each other: a
silent agreement is enough; 

54

You could overhear other people's conversations with immense delight,
overjoyed at your good luck, as if it were a personal achievement; 

55

You could resort to various tricks so your joy would know no bounds whatsoever;

56

You could get together to discuss the situation at hand;

57

You could get together to decide what is stronger:
	--the necessity of the breakthrough into a new metaphysical
reality or the pathological dread of a false step; 
	--the speculative understanding of a departure from an automated
sphere or the emotional attachment to it; 
	--the clear foundation of the freedom of choice or the striving to
recognize with the will of a usurper; 
	--the voice of desired peace or something else;
	--etc.

58

You could speak about the danger of prominence, often disguised as importance;

59

You could talk about your fleeting impressions endlessly, but who knows
how productive it is; 

60

You could speak seriously about nothing but the idea of productivity, but
who knows what in the world it really means; 

61

You could discuss all of this with a seriousness no more and no less than
the subject of the discussion merits; 

62

You could suddenly imagine that a final decision is made, but that's
exactly what should be feared; 

63

You could suddenly direct your gaze at one of multiple manifestations of
reality and, later, call it the arbitrary choice of object; 

64

You could suddenly declare to all within earshot what you wouldn't even
say in secret; 

65

You could suddenly grow ashamed of something you said and try to
neutralize it by your next statement; 

66

You could suddenly declare without exaltation and coquetry about your own
incompetence-but this, first of all, is almost impossible, and second of
all, is completely unnecessary; 

67

You could, in essence, express your last will, but in such a strange way
that everyone will be thinking the same thing; 

68

You could, with a passing mention of someone's name, suddenly force
everyone to exchange glances; 

69

You could suddenly move and win someone over with the utmost triviality; 

70

You could shoot the breeze, not worrying whether you make a good
impression or not; 

71

You could endlessly withdraw from an object or draw near an object, not
condescending to generalizations of any kind; 

72

You could, probably, tell about a situation in such a way that no one
would turn out to be a non-participant; 

73

You could make sure once again that everything is in its rightful
place-for that, you just have to unexpectedly look back; 

74

You could leave at any moment, and you could arrive at any moment in order
to make sure that everything is in its rightful place; 

75

You could say something as you go by or you could keep quiet;

76

You could, in one powerful breath, blurt out everything you know, but the
meaning will turn out to be the breath alone; 

77

You could move closer in order to hear what they are talking about;

78

You could suddenly hear what you already know;

79

You could find out all that you need, even without resorting to inquiries;

80

You could, by the way, not knowing what someone's talking about, get drunk
from a feeling of inner kinship; 

81

You could imagine anyone in any situation-and that would be a comedic novelty;


82

You could, not risking to appear ridiculous, believe that your voice will
be heard, no matter what--that would also be a comedic novelty; 

83

You could artistically disregard a system of your own beliefs, if such
disregard has the ability to become a comedic novelty; 

84

You could pay no attention at all to whatever you don't want to consider a
comedic novelty; 

85

You could stay exactly where you are, both in the literal and in the
figurative sense, and this also would pass as a comedic novelty; 

86

You could take a bit of everything in an arbitrary order and in arbitrary
proportions-it's no secret that it would be a comedic novelty; 

87

You could sharpen a comedic consciousness so that someone who's sleeping
would suddenly wake up a great comic; 

88

You could explain all of this with completely different reasons;

89

You could explain this, for example, as the dread of a false step, but it
would hardly be a true explanation; 

90

You could take the mere weak twinkle of conceptual contours for relapses
of the most unbridled lyricism of past ages; 

91

You could think any deliberate form is conservative, and proceed from this
in the estimation of things; 

92

You could think that it will end just with what it began;

93

You could think that something completely unusual is happening;

94

You could think that nothing happened;

95

You could end up noticing nothing at all;

96

You could know beforehand what will end with what, but it's highly
non-comedic to reveal this knowledge; 

97

You could declare the very uncertainty as the cornerstone;

98

You could comply with your natural craving for leisure and inactivity;

99

You could very well live on the remains of passed festivities-but who
needs this; 

100

You could search for a nod of true salvation even in fruitless
manipulations with memory; 

101

You could perceive, in the very fact of comedic preconceptions, the secret
sign of fatal numbness; 

102

You could run from fatal numbness, if you could adopt properly a principle
of comedy; 

103

You could, on the other hand, fail to be imbued with the spirit of comedic
novelties, but you really can't do anything about it; 

104

You could reject given possibilities and think that nothing took place;

105

You could continue in this vein;

106

You could cease all of this at any moment-and this is the good thing about
comedic novelties; 

107

You could wait awhile, then begin with renewed strength;

108

You could repeat everything from the beginning;

109

You could stop thinking about the consequences: their nature will be comedic;

110

You could stop worrying about tomorrow: its nature will be comedic.