Poems and prose of some laureates of the competition "With Trediakovsky - in the 21st century" - 2016

(On my page I risk publishing my students and those whose creative destinies I have a direct relationship with).

There are many young poets, but far from all can express their thoughts in prose. A twelve-year-old pupil of the Lukomorye literary studio, a student of grade 6 "B" of secondary school No. 55, surprises me more and more with her deep, childish reflections on the meaning of being, the origins of creativity, and the world around her.

The girl is clearly winged with fantasy and gifted from above with the ability for deep philosophical research.

It is also good that Sasha does not love himself in creativity, but creativity in himself, tirelessly getting acquainted with interesting works on literary portals. She immediately sends links to them on social networks, introducing her friends, including me, to the world of beauty. It was Sasha who became the youngest laureate of the 2016 competition:

WHAT IS FATE?

Many of us will say that this is what God intended for us. Others will say it's just a phrase. Only a few dare to say what is fate, or maybe what is fate? You know, maybe you've been in situations where it's completely stranger tells you: "Look at it from the other side" or "A wise man once said..." And so on. Or maybe your neighbor told you this? Maybe you sometimes had to look at animals, objects or people and your worldview changed or your whole life changed?

You know, you can guess like this ad infinitum, but I'll tell you one thing for sure. Fate is such a creature - an experiment of God and the Devil. Yes, do not be surprised - Fate is a creature. She is alive and should not be treated with disdain.

However, I made a conclusion and an argument for myself, but what conclusion and argument you make for yourself is up to you to decide, isn't it?

ALEXANDRA TIMOFEEVA, 12 years old

Daniil Blokhin, at the age of 11, became the laureate of a very serious regional poetry competition dedicated to the 69th anniversary of the Great Victory of the Soviet people in the bloody war of 1941-1945, held jointly by the Astrakhan regional branch of the Writers' Union of Russia and the Astrakhan regional Council of supporters of the All-Russian political party "United Russia" ".

The boy is fond of not only poetry. Karate, break dance, theater studio and good studies Love for animals is not everything. He defended creative project on the topic: "Artistic and expressive language means in the verses of military subjects." Daniil skillfully read a poem by Alexander Sakhnov at the evening in memory of Zakir Dakenov and spoke at the Night at the Museum event in the arsenal in the Astrakhan Kremlin.

Daniil is not yet thinking about choosing a future profession. But for sure it will be something related to art. Daniil Blokhin will soon publish his first poetry collection, which we are looking forward to.

***
I'm standing on the edge
And look down into the ravine
How I'm afraid to fall
Taking a small step
Down there, the unknown.
What is waiting for me there?
Maybe a black abyss
To the delight of the enemies?
Or maybe there are people
All with an open mind.
And I will be happy
What will I become there
I don't know what's next
What's next for me.
If only there were no falsehood
And global adversity.

DANIL BLOKHIN, 13 years old

Alisa Liven, a graduate of the Snowdrop Youth Literary Workshop, began her creative career in early childhood, writing stories for a school circle, later she began to experiment with different genres of prose and poetry, expanding her circle of literary activity.

At the age of twenty-one, the girl released the first collection of short stories published by the Moscow publishing house "R & M", her second story "Leaving-go away" was redirected to England and was published there in a small circulation, spreading within London.

She whispered with the midnight wind
She danced under the ringing downpour,
She taught me to love with all my heart
She knew everything, but she was silent...
She was loved by animals and children,
She treated the sick for free,
She was just free
But someone shouted: "Burn the witch!"
She just told the truth
She just loved the wind
She lived only by the call of her heart
And someone shouted: "Burn the witch!"
She healed bodies and souls
She didn't know what "malice" meant.
She was led to the fire by those people
whom she had previously saved.
And the song of the wind flew with a cry,
And the rain poured down, but the fire is stronger
She was laughing. The crowd shouted:
"Burn the witch! Burn the witch!"

ALICE SHOWER

At the awards ceremony, I was touched by the fact that Sergey Mkrtychants performed the poem "Monk", which he wrote long ago, while still a third-grader, a pupil of the literary studio "Snowdrop".

Today, a graduate of ASU is the owner of a special prize of the Astrakhan Readings competition in 2014, a finalist of the Astrakhan Readings in 2015.

Sergey is a permanent host and participant of the Volga Palette venues, organizer and host of the monthly "Successful Evenings", co-organizer and head of the AstPuerism MLO, host of the Golden Fox trainings, host of the AstPuer studio.

Sergey's energy can be envied. The young man is tireless in the search for new talents, in organizing innovative creative meetings, so unlike those that are held "for show". He is a real find for urban intellectual shows. Too bad so few people know about it...

V. Mayakovsky and R. Rozhdestvensky

The word owns me.
Be poetic rocks,
slave swarm
It would turn the other way around.

Poetic, be I blood,
Curved rhyme into an arc
Then I would say what I wanted.
Now I say what I can.

I would say the words were "spender and spendthrift",
"I would write on the skin of zebras"
Massifs would be rocks
Moved from the pages of newspapers.

And from them sanded power,
Censorship would taste bitterness.
Then I'd taste it to my heart's content
Your hearts are on fire!

Dreaming is not harmful sometimes:
Like, if I were the owner of rhymes ...
The word owns me
Fall in love with yourself once.

SERGEY MKRTYCHANTS

In November 2015, declared the Year of Literature by UNESCO, Lyudmila Viktorovna Poltarikhina, Deputy Director for Teaching and Educational Work of the Astrakhan Gymnasium No. 1, initiated and successfully implemented the project of the research conference for schoolchildren of the Astrakhan region “My Literary Land”.

The organizing committee of the competition included such organizations as Astrakhan State University, Institute for the Development of Education and the Astrakhan regional branch of the All-Russian public organization Union of Writers of Russia.

In fairness, I note that a schoolboy from Liman Kirill Dolin was noted at the conference by Marina Lazareva. I simply "juried" in the section of older guys. Despite the fact that on that day the boy was awarded only third place, she began an active search for a talented student. Thanks to my co-author, composer Pavel Bulychev, who went around the entire Limansky district and found Kirill! It was in such a difficult way that his work got into the competition "With Trediakovsky - in the 21st century." It's good when several adult friends take part in the fate of a young talent at once.

MAIN LESSON

Dedicated to great-grandmother

There was a lesson in the fifth grade German language. The guys repeated in chorus: “Ikh male, du malst ...” Natalya Alekseevna listened carefully to this discordant choir. Seryozhka Kopalkin, who was sitting on the last desk, deliberately, with all his might, distorted the words. Why he did this was understandable. Less than ten years later, the victory saluted. Not everyone's fathers returned. She did not get angry at all, and, looking at the guys, she said quietly: “I was twenty when I saw the war. Then, in forty-two, I could not even imagine that I would speak the language of the country that brought us so much grief.
... Natasha, jumping over the high steps of the porch, ran into the house. “Mom, I'm leaving…” The mother, holding little Galya in her arms, quickly put her on the bed and covered her face with her hands. “Mom, we are all leaving ... I, Sonya, only Dusi has a reservation.” In the evening my father came. "What did the commissar say? Where are the fees? - “It seems that they will send to the tank. And fees in Kamyshin. “Well, then, I’ll take it myself. Take your boots."
By September 1942, Natasha, having left her studies at the institute, had already completed courses for tractor drivers in Bykovo. The girls replaced the men who had gone to the front. And at night it was necessary to be on duty at the fire tower. The Germans bombed and shot at Bykovy farms right on schedule. The situation near Stalingrad was changing rapidly. The Nazis had already reached the city center and, in the area of ​​​​the central crossing, broke through to the Volga. Siberian regiments went through the farm to help. Natasha received a summons from the Bykovsky RVC.
The streets of Kamyshin seethed and did not stop for a minute. There was a formation of columns, which immediately went to their destination. Father tightly hugged Natasha: “Look, Natka, both. This is not your fire station. Write. And when you return, you will teach Galka to read. “I will definitely be back, dad. I'll be back".
In the insane fire of the Battle of Stalingrad every second burned. Volga sobbed hot tears. An avalanche of three fronts rolled over Stalingrad. Not lagging behind the advanced units, the eighteenth front-line training tank regiment advanced along the torn native land. “Don't worry, the contusion is mild. The main thing is that everything is fine with you, that you live, that the city of Stalin lives, ”the lines of the letter flew. She never doubted for a moment that the city would be defended. And they defended. And on a slightly yellowed gymnast, the medal "For the Defense of Stalingrad" shone.
Natalya entered Kharkov as the commander of a transport platoon of the 18th front-line training tank regiment of the 4th Ukrainian Front. The liberation of bloodless Ukraine began. Here she learned about the terrible atrocities of the Nazis, about the hanged and tortured underground workers. The Nazis with all their fury avenged Paulus and the lost Stalingrad. It was then that it became clear that there was another enemy that you would not meet in battle. Even in the Ukrainian towns and villages already liberated from the Germans, saboteurs were swarming. Natasha for a long time could not understand how she, being in the operational group of the headquarters, managed not only to figure out, but also to neutralize the Nazi henchman. Gently pulling out the revolver, she heard her own voice from the side: “Weapons on the table! Hands!”
... “On behalf of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, for the exemplary performance of the combat missions of the command on the front of the fight against the German invaders and the valor and courage shown at the same time, to award the squad leader Natalya Alekseevna Edalova with the medal “For Military Merit,” the order sounded before the June thunder. Among the awardees were her comrades-in-arms: senior sergeant Ivan Barvinok, foreman Alexander Vinogradov, senior sergeant Alexander Yermolov. The war will end in a year. And now... Now they were walking along other open roads, every day bringing the long-awaited victory closer.
Finally the bell rang. The corridors were noisy. For some reason, there was silence in the classroom. “Guys,” said Natalya Alekseevna, “the lesson has already ended, run.” The kids, grabbing their briefcases, rushed in a whirlwind one after another.
We cannot count how many such school lessons begin and end with the usual bell. But there is a lesson that will never end for the guys of the distant fifties, and for us living in the twenty-first century. it main lesson eternal memory, the memory of our heroes, of those who through time carry the banner of the great Victory.

KIRILL DOLIN, LIMAN

Not a day goes by that social network we did not contact a high school student from one of the districts of the Astrakhan region Nastya Syzranova. She is a student of Yuri Shcherbakov, I just help her a little. It was great to see Anastasia among the winners of the competition.

Tumak, my small homeland,
How lucky I am to have you!
After all, no matter how many roads are passed,
You will return to your native village!

Your expanses cordially
I love every day and hour.
Little house by the river
A haven for the heart and eyes!

Neighbors, friends, relatives -
Everyone believes in me, love.
Tumak - you are my Russia!
I can't go a day without you!

ANASTASIA SYZRANOVA, Volodarsky settlement, Volodarsky district, Tumak village

I am still under the impression of Vladimir Orlov's dedication to his young wife Alexandra. And he wrote this, my irrepressible “Noise of Rain” (pseudonym, nickname and reason for any appeal to Volodya in the middle of the “zero”, when he was tirelessly naughty in my “Snowdrop” as a teenager!). He sometimes disrupted classes, but the fact that he was a poet was immediately clear to me, so he was forgiven a lot.

Vladimir Orlov, born in 1987. The specificity of his work is connected with computers and folk crafts. In addition to poetry, she enjoys role-playing games, reconstruction, plays the guitar a little. In life, as well as in creativity, he loves confrontation - duels, including literary ones.

He likes to travel, so the theme of the road is also often present in his works. He believes that the works of Blok, Yesenin and Lermontov had a rather strong influence on his work, and in places a noticeable influence. Laureate of the Ninel Mordovina Literary Competition in 2011.

Who calls Jesus God, who is Ra, who is Jupiter,
For me, my real god is better than others, yes.
For some time he filmed Olympus near St. Petersburg
(He often changes his - so he had to - cities)

Your mind is boiling, and theories have cracked?
Are old paradigms coming apart at the seams?
It's simple - I call my god a woman,
And with it someday we will give birth to new gods.

What do I care about distances and trains erased letters?
What do I need stops, my own and other people's stations?
My god has now left Peter,
And somewhere near Nizhny he shoots Valhalla for himself.

VLADIMIR ORLOV

I share my joy - one of the winners of the competition was my classmate Galina Karbanova, a member of the literary studio "Tamarisk" at the Astrakhan writers' organization:

Life is playful and changeable:
You fly to the right, then to the left.
I'm just an ordinary woman...
Not! Today I am the queen!
I am not heavy crown shackles,
Ermine hugs are not stuffy.
I'm the queen (what's wrong with that?!)
Even in the most ordinary dress.
And the most tender hands, and the body,
And eyes with a deep veil, -
I wanted to see myself like this
In your mirror alone.
We are the opposite. And look gently.
Vis-a-vis. Me and the one on the left.
Through the looking glass and my former life.
Just a Woman and a Queen!

GALINA KARBANOV

In the photo of Sergei Ivanov, Vladimir and Alexander Orlov

Texts for reading at competitions of readers of prose works

Vasiliev B.L. And the dawns here are quiet.// Series “100 main books. Heirs, 2015

Swaying and stumbling, he wandered through the Sinyukhin ridge towards the Germans. The revolver with the last cartridge was tightly clutched in his hand, and now he only wanted the Germans to meet as soon as possible and so that he could bring down another one. Because the forces were gone. There was no strength at all - only pain. All over the body...

White twilight floated quietly over the heated stones. Fog was already accumulating in the lowlands, the breeze had subsided, and mosquitoes hung in a cloud over the foreman. And he seemed to see his girls in this whitish haze, all five of them, and he kept whispering something and shaking his head sadly.

But there were no Germans. They did not come across to him, they did not shoot, although he walked heavily and openly and was looking for this meeting. It was time to end this war, it was time to put an end to it, and this last point was kept in the gray bore of his revolver.

He didn't have a goal now, he only had a desire. He did not circle, did not look for traces, but walked straight, as if wound up. But the Germans were not and were not ...

He had already passed the pine forest and was now walking through the forest, with every minute approaching the hermitage of Legont, where in the morning he so easily got himself a weapon. He did not think why he was going there, but the unmistakable hunting instinct led him that way, and he obeyed him. And, obeying him, he suddenly slowed down his steps, listened and slipped into the bushes.

A hundred meters away began a clearing with a rotten log cabin of a well and a warped hut that had driven into the ground. And this hundred meters Vaskov passed silently and weightlessly. He knew that there was an enemy there, he knew exactly and inexplicably how a wolf knows where a hare will jump out at him.

In the bushes near the clearing he froze and stood for a long time, not moving, his eyes searching the log house, near which there was no longer a German he had killed, a rickety skete, dark bushes in the corners. There was nothing special there, nothing was noticed, but the foreman continued to wait patiently. And when a vague spot floated a little from the corner of the hut, he was not surprised. He already knew that the sentry was standing there.

He walked towards him for a long, infinitely long time. Slowly, as in a dream, he raised his leg, weightlessly lowered it to the ground and did not step over - he poured the weight drop by drop so that not a single twig would crackle. In this strange bird dance, he circled the clearing and found himself behind the motionless sentinel. And even more slowly, even more smoothly moved to this broad dark back. Didn't go - swam.

And stopped walking. He held his breath for a long time and now waited for his heart to calm down. He had long ago put his revolver into his holster, held a knife in his right hand, and now, feeling the heavy smell of someone else's body, slowly, millimeter by millimeter, brought the Finn for a single, decisive blow.

And he was still gaining strength. There were few of them. Very little, but left hand could no longer help.

He put everything into this blow, everything, to the last drop. The German hardly cried out, only sighed strangely, languidly, and leaned on his knees. The sergeant-major yanked open the beveled door and jumped into the hut.

- Hyundai hoh! ..

And they were sleeping. We slept off before the last throw to the piece of iron. Only one did not sleep: he rushed into the corner, to the weapon, but Vaskov caught this gallop of his and almost point-blank put a bullet into the German. The roar hit the low ceiling, the Fritz was thrown against the wall, and the foreman suddenly forgot all the German words and only shouted hoarsely:

- Lie down! .. Lie down! .. Lie down! ..

And cursed with black words. The blackest ones I knew.

No, they were not afraid of a scream, not a grenade, which was brandished by the foreman. They simply could not think, even imagine in their thoughts that he was alone, alone for many miles. This concept did not fit into their fascist brains, and therefore they lay down on the floor: muzzles down, as ordered. All four lay down: the fifth, the quickest, was already listed in the next world.

And they tied each other with straps, tied them neatly, and Fedot Evgrafych personally tied the last one. And cried. Tears streamed down his dirty, unshaven face, he was shaking in a chill, and laughed through these tears, and shouted:

- What, they took it? .. They took it, right? .. Five girls, five girls were in total, only five! But you didn’t get through, didn’t go anywhere, and you’ll die here, you’ll all die! .. I’ll kill everyone personally, personally, even if the authorities have mercy! And then let them judge me! Let them judge!

And his hand ached, so ached that everything in him burned and his thoughts were confused. And therefore he was especially afraid of losing consciousness and clung to him, from the last strength he clung to ...

… That last way he could never remember. The German backs were swaying ahead, dangling from side to side, because Vaskov was swaying as if he were drunk. And he did not see anything, except for these four spins, and he only thought of one thing: to have time to press the trigger of the machine gun before he loses consciousness. And it hung on the last gossamer, and such pain burned all over his body that he growled from that pain. Growled and cried: exhausted, apparently, completely ...

But only then did he allow his consciousness to break off when they called out to them and when he realized that his own people were coming towards them. Russian…

V.P. Kataev. Son of the regiment // School library, Moscow, Children's Literature, 1977

The scouts slowly moved towards their location.

Suddenly the elder stopped and raised his hand. At the same moment, the others also stopped, keeping their eyes on their commander. The eldest stood for a long time, throwing back the hood from his head and slightly turning his ear in the direction from which he heard a suspicious rustle. The eldest was a young man of about twenty-two. Despite his youth, he was already considered an experienced soldier on the battery. He was a sergeant. His comrades loved him and at the same time were afraid of him.

The sound that attracted the attention of Sergeant Yegorov - such was the surname of the elder - seemed very strange. Despite all his experience, Yegorov could not understand its character and meaning.

"What could it be?" thought Yegorov, straining his ears and quickly turning over in his mind all the suspicious sounds that he had ever heard in a night reconnaissance.

"Whisper! No. The cautious rustle of a shovel? No. File squealing? Not".

A strange, quiet, intermittent sound unlike anything else was heard somewhere very close, to the right, behind a juniper bush. It looked like the sound was coming from somewhere underground.

After listening for another minute or two, Yegorov, without turning around, gave a sign, and both scouts slowly and silently, like shadows, approached him closely. He showed with his hand the direction from which the sound was coming, and signaled to listen. The scouts began to listen.

- Hear? Yegorov asked with his lips alone.

“Hear,” one of the soldiers answered just as silently.

Yegorov turned to his comrades his thin, dark face, dejectedly illuminated by the moon. He raised his boyish eyebrows high.

- Do not understand.

For some time, the three of them stood and listened, putting their fingers on the triggers of their machine guns. The sounds continued and were just as incomprehensible. For a moment they suddenly changed their character. All three thought they heard singing coming out of the ground. They exchanged glances. But immediately the sounds became the same.

Then Yegorov signaled to lie down and lay down on his stomach on the leaves, which were already gray with frost. He took a dagger in his mouth and crawled, silently pulling himself up on his elbows, like a plastuna.

A minute later, he disappeared behind a dark juniper bush, and a minute later, which seemed as long as an hour, the scouts heard a thin whistle. It meant that Yegorov was calling them to him. They crawled and soon saw the sergeant kneeling, peering into a small trench hidden among the junipers.

From the trench, muttering, sobbing, sleepy moans were clearly heard. Understanding each other without words, the scouts surrounded the trench and stretched out the ends of their raincoats with their hands so that they formed something like a tent that did not let in the light. Egorov lowered his hand with an electric flashlight into the trench.

The picture they saw was simple and at the same time terrible.

The boy was sleeping in the trench.

Clenching his arms on his chest, tucking his bare, dark as potatoes legs, the boy lay in a green stinking puddle and raved heavily in his sleep. His uncovered head, overgrown with long uncut, dirty hair, was awkwardly thrown back. His thin throat quivered. A hoarse sigh flew out of a sunken mouth with fever-swept, inflamed lips. There were mutterings, fragments of unintelligible words, sobs. The bulging eyelids of the closed eyes were of an unhealthy, anaemic color. They looked almost blue, like skimmed milk. Short but thick eyelashes stuck together with arrows. His face was covered in scratches and bruises. There was a clot of dried blood on the bridge of the nose.

The boy was asleep, and on his exhausted face frantically ran reflections of the nightmares that haunted the boy in his sleep. Every minute his face changed expression. Then it froze in horror; that inhuman despair distorted him; then the sharp, deep features of hopeless grief cut through around his sunken mouth, his eyebrows rose like a house, and tears rolled down from his eyelashes; then suddenly the teeth began to grind furiously, the face became angry, merciless, the fists were clenched with such force that the nails dug into the palms, and dull, hoarse sounds flew out of the tense throat. And then suddenly the boy fell into unconsciousness, smiled a pitiful, completely childish and childishly helpless smile, and began very weakly, almost audibly, to sing some unintelligible song.

The boy's sleep was so heavy, so deep, his soul, wandering through the torments of dreams, was so far from his body that for some time he did not feel anything: neither the intent eyes of the scouts looking at him from above, nor the bright light of an electric flashlight, illuminating his face.

But suddenly the boy seemed to be struck from the inside, thrown up. He woke up, jumped up, sat down. His eyes flashed wildly. In an instant, he pulled out a large sharpened nail from somewhere. With a deft, precise movement, Yegorov managed to intercept the boy's hot hand and close his mouth with his palm.

- Quiet. His own, - Yegorov said in a whisper.

Only now the boy noticed that the helmets of the soldiers were Russian, the machine guns were Russian, the raincoats were Russian, and the faces leaning towards him were also Russian, native.

A joyful smile flickered palely on his emaciated face. He wanted to say something, but managed to utter only one word:

And lost consciousness.

M. Prishvin. Blue dragonfly.// Sat. Prishvin M.M. "Green Noise", series: My notebooks. M., Pravda, 1983

In that first world war In 1914, I went to the front as a war correspondent in the uniform of an orderly and soon found myself in a battle in the west in the Augustow forests. I wrote down all my impressions in my short way, but, I confess, not for a single minute did the feeling of personal uselessness and the impossibility of catching up with the terrible things that were happening around me leave me.

I walked along the road towards the war and played with death: either a shell fell, exploding a deep funnel, or a bullet buzzed like a bee, but I kept walking, curiously looking at the flocks of partridges flying from battery to battery.

I looked and saw the head of Maxim Maksimych: his bronze face with gray mustaches was stern and almost solemn. At the same time, the old captain managed to express both sympathy and patronage to me. A minute later I was slurping cabbage soup in his dugout. Soon, when the matter flared up, he called out to me:

- But how can you, a writer you are so-and-so, not ashamed at such moments to deal with your trifles?

- What should I do? I asked, very pleased with his determined tone.

- Run immediately, raise those people over there, order the benches from the school to drag, pick up and lay down the wounded.

I lifted people, dragged benches, laid down the wounded, forgot the writer in me, and suddenly I finally felt like a real person, and I was so happy that I was here in the war, not only a writer.

At this time, a dying man whispered to me:

- Here's some water.

At the first word of the wounded man, I ran for water.

But he did not drink and repeated to me:

- Water, water, stream.

I looked at him in amazement, and suddenly I understood everything: he was almost a boy with shining eyes, with thin, quivering lips, reflecting the trembling of the soul.

The orderly and I took a stretcher and carried him to the bank of the stream. The orderly left, I remained face to face with the dying boy on the bank of the forest stream.

In the slanting rays of the evening sun, minarets of horsetails, leaves of telorez, water lilies shone with a special green light, as if coming from within the plants, a blue dragonfly circled over the pool. And quite close to us, where the creek ended, the trickles of the stream, uniting on pebbles, sang their usual beautiful song. The wounded man listened with his eyes closed, his bloodless lips moving convulsively, expressing a strong struggle. And so the fight ended with a sweet childish smile, and eyes opened.

“Thank you,” he whispered.

Seeing a blue dragonfly flying by the pool, he smiled again, said thanks again, and closed his eyes again.

Some time passed in silence, when suddenly the lips moved again, a new struggle arose, and I heard:

What, is she still flying?

The blue dragonfly was still circling.

- It flies, - I answered, - and how!

He smiled again and fell into oblivion.

Meanwhile, little by little, it grew dark, and I, too, flew far away in my thoughts, and forgot myself. Suddenly I hear him ask:

- Still flying?

“It flies,” I said, without looking, without thinking.

Why can't I see? he asked, opening his eyes with difficulty.

I was scared. I once happened to see a dying man who, before his death, suddenly lost his sight, and yet spoke to us quite reasonably. Is it not so here: his eyes died earlier. But I myself looked at the place where the dragonfly flew, and saw nothing.

The patient realized that I had deceived him, was upset by my inattention and silently closed his eyes.

It hurt me, and suddenly I saw the reflection of a flying dragonfly in the clear water. We could not notice it against the background of the darkening forest, but the water - these eyes of the earth remain bright when it gets dark: these eyes seem to see in the darkness.

- It flies, it flies! I exclaimed so decisively, so joyfully, that the patient immediately opened his eyes.

And I showed him the reflection. And he smiled.

I will not describe how we saved this wounded man - apparently, the doctors saved him. But I firmly believe that they, the doctors, were helped by the song of the stream and my resolute and excited words that the blue dragonfly flew over the creek even in the dark.

A. Platonov. Unknown flower.

And once one seed fell from the wind, and it sheltered in a hole between stone and clay. This seed languished for a long time, and then it was saturated with dew, disintegrated, let out thin hairs of the root, stuck them into stone and clay, and began to grow. So that little flower began to live in the world. He had nothing to eat in stone and clay; raindrops that fell from the sky descended over the top of the earth and did not penetrate to its root, but the flower lived and lived and grew little by little higher. He lifted the leaves against the wind, and the wind died down near the flower; dust particles fell from the wind onto the clay, which the wind brought from the black fat earth; and in those dust particles there was food for the flower, but the dust particles were dry. To moisten them, the flower guarded the dew all night and collected it drop by drop on its leaves. And when the leaves were heavy with dew, the flower lowered them, and the dew fell down; it moistened the black earthen dust that the wind brought, and corroded the dead clay. During the day, the flower was guarded by the wind, and at night by the dew. He worked day and night to live and not die. He grew his leaves large so that they could stop the wind and collect the dew. However, it was difficult for a flower to feed on only dust particles that fell from the wind, and still collect dew for them. But he needed life and patiently overcame his pain from hunger and fatigue. Only once a day did the flower rejoice: when the first ray of the morning sun touched its weary leaves. If the wind did not come to the wasteland for a long time, then it became bad for a small flower, and it no longer had the strength to live and grow. The flower, however, did not want to live sadly; therefore, when he was quite sad, he dozed off. Yet he constantly tried to grow, even if his roots gnawed at bare stone and dry clay. At such a time, its leaves could not be saturated with full strength and become green: one of their veins was blue, the other red, the third blue or gold. This happened because the flower lacked food, and its torment was indicated in the leaves by different colors. The flower itself, however, did not know this: after all, it was blind and did not see itself as it is. In the middle of summer, the flower opened a corolla at the top. Before that, it looked like grass, but now it has become a real flower. His corolla was composed of the petals of a simple light color, clear and strong, like a star. And, like a star, it shone with a living flickering fire, and it was visible even on a dark night. And when the wind came to the wasteland, it always touched the flower and carried away its scent with it. And then one morning the girl Dasha was walking past that wasteland. She lived with her friends in a pioneer camp, and this morning she woke up and missed her mother. She wrote a letter to her mother and took the letter to the station so that it would reach her sooner. On the way, Dasha kissed the envelope with the letter and envied him that he would see his mother sooner than she did. At the edge of the wasteland, Dasha felt a fragrance. She looked around. There were no flowers near, only small grass grew along the path, and the wasteland was completely bare; but the wind was blowing from the wasteland and bringing a quiet smell from there, like the calling voice of a small unknown life. Dasha remembered a fairy tale, her mother told her a long time ago. The mother spoke of a flower that was always sad for its mother - a rose, but it could not cry, and only in the fragrance passed its sadness. “Perhaps it is the flower that misses its mother there, as I do,” thought Dasha. She went to the wasteland and saw that small flower near the stone. Dasha had never seen such a flower before - neither in the field, nor in the forest, nor in the book in the picture, nor in the botanical garden, nowhere. She sat down on the ground near the flower and asked him: - Why are you like this? “I don’t know,” answered the flower. - And why are you different from others? The flower again did not know what to say. But for the first time he heard the voice of a man so closely, for the first time someone looked at him, and he did not want to offend Dasha by silence. “Because it’s hard for me,” answered the flower. - What is your name? Dasha asked. - Nobody calls me, - said a small flower, - I live alone. Dasha looked around in the wasteland. - Here is a stone, here is clay! - she said. - How do you live alone, how did you grow out of clay and not die, such a small one? “I don’t know,” answered the flower. Dasha leaned towards him and kissed his luminous head. The next day, all the pioneers came to visit the little flower. Dasha brought them, but long before reaching the wasteland, she ordered everyone to breathe and said: - Hear how good it smells. This is how he breathes.

The pioneers stood around a small flower for a long time and admired it like a hero. Then they walked around the whole wasteland, measured it with steps and counted how many wheelbarrows with manure and ashes would need to be brought to fertilize the dead clay. They wanted the land to become good in the wasteland as well. Then even a small flower, unknown by name, will rest, and beautiful children will grow from its seeds and not die, the best flowers shining with light, which are not found anywhere else. Pioneers worked for four days, fertilizing the land in a wasteland. And after that they went to travel to other fields and forests and did not come to the wasteland again. Only Dasha came once to say goodbye to a small flower. Summer was already ending, the pioneers had to go home, and they left. And the next summer, Dasha again came to the same pioneer camp. All through the long winter she remembered the little flower, unknown by name. And she immediately went to the wasteland to visit him. Dasha saw that the wasteland was now different, it was now overgrown with herbs and flowers, and birds and butterflies were flying over it. There was a fragrance from the flowers, the same as from that little worker flower. However, last year's flower, which lived between stone and clay, was gone. He must have died last fall. The new flowers were also good; they were only slightly worse than that first flower. And Dasha felt sad that there was no former flower. She walked back and suddenly stopped. Between two narrow stones grew new flower- exactly the same as that old color, only a little better and even more beautiful. This flower grew from the middle of the shy stones; he was lively and patient, like his father, and even stronger than his father, because he lived in stone. It seemed to Dasha that the flower was reaching out to her, that he was calling her to him with the silent voice of his fragrance.

G. Andersen. Nightingale.

And suddenly a wonderful singing was heard outside the window. It was a small living nightingale. He learned that the emperor was ill and flew in to comfort and encourage him. He sat on a branch and sang, and the terrible ghosts that surrounded the emperor grew paler and paler, and the blood rushed faster and hotter to the emperor’s heart.

Death itself listened to the nightingale and only quietly repeated:

Sing, nightingale! Sing some more!

Will you give me a precious saber for this? And the banner? And the crown? - asked the nightingale.

Death nodded her head and gave away one treasure after another, and the nightingale sang and sang. Here he sang a song about a quiet cemetery, where elderberry blooms, white roses are fragrant, and tears of the living, mourning their loved ones, shine in the fresh grass on the graves. Then Death so wanted to return to his home, to a quiet cemetery, that she wrapped herself in a cold white fog and flew out the window.

Thank you, dear bird! - said the emperor. - How can I reward you?

You have already rewarded me,” said the nightingale. - I saw tears in your eyes when I sang in front of you for the first time - I will never forget this. Sincere tears of delight are the most precious reward for a singer!

And he sang again, and the emperor fell into a healthy, sound sleep.

And when he woke up, the sun was already shining brightly through the window. None of the courtiers and servants even looked at the emperor. Everyone thought he was dead. One nightingale did not leave the patient. He sat outside the window and sang even better than ever.

Stay with me! the emperor asked. - You will sing only when you want to.

I can't live in a palace. I will fly to you when I myself want, and I will sing about the happy and the unfortunate, about good and evil, about everything that is happening around you and that you do not know. A small songbird flies everywhere - flies under the roof of a poor peasant hut, and into a fisherman's house, which stand so far from your palace. I will fly and sing to you! But promise me...

All you want! - exclaimed the emperor and got up from the bed.

He had already put on his imperial attire and pressed a heavy golden saber to his heart.

Promise me not to tell anyone that you have a little bird that tells you everything. big world. So things will go better.

And the nightingale flew away.

Then the courtiers entered, they gathered to look at the dead emperor, and they froze on the threshold.

And the emperor said to them:

Hello! FROM Good morning!

Sunny day at the very beginning of summer. I wander not far from home, in a birch copse. Everything around seems to be bathed, splashing in golden waves of heat and light. Birch branches flow above me. The leaves on them seem either emerald green or completely golden. And below, under the birches, on the grass, too, like waves, light bluish shadows run and stream. And bright bunnies, like the reflections of the sun in the water, run one after another along the grass, along the path.

The sun is both in the sky and on the ground... And it becomes so good, so fun that you want to run away somewhere far away, to where the trunks of young birch trees sparkle with their dazzling whiteness.

And suddenly, from this sunny distance, I heard a familiar forest voice: "Ku-ku, ku-ku!"

Cuckoo! I've heard it many times before, but I've never even seen it in a picture. What is she like? For some reason, she seemed to me plump, big-headed, like an owl. But maybe she's not like that at all? I'll run and take a look.

Alas, it turned out to be far from easy. I - to her voice. And she will be silent, and here again: “Ku-ku, ku-ku”, but in a completely different place.

How to see it? I stopped in thought. Maybe she's playing hide-and-seek with me? She hides, and I'm looking. And let's play the other way around: now I'll hide, and you look.

I climbed into a hazel bush and also cuckooed once, twice. The cuckoo fell silent, maybe looking for me? I sit silently and I, even my heart is pounding with excitement. And suddenly somewhere nearby: "Ku-ku, ku-ku!"

I am silent: look better, don't shout at the whole forest.

And she is already very close: "Ku-ku, ku-ku!"

I look: some kind of bird flies through the clearing, the tail is long, it is gray itself, only the breast is covered with dark spots. Probably a hawk. This one in our yard hunts for sparrows. He flew up to a neighboring tree, sat down on a branch, bent down and shouted: "Ku-ku, ku-ku!"

Cuckoo! That's it! So, she is not like an owl, but like a hawk.

I will cuckoo her from the bush in response! With a fright, she almost fell off the tree, immediately rushed down from the branch, sniffing somewhere in the thicket, only I saw her.

But I don't need to see her anymore. So I solved the forest riddle, and besides, for the first time I myself spoke to the bird in its native language.

So the sonorous forest voice of the cuckoo revealed to me the first secret of the forest. And since then, for half a century now, I have been wandering in winter and summer along deaf, untrodden paths and discovering more and more new secrets. And there is no end to these winding paths, and there is no end to mysteries native nature.

G. Skrebitsky. Four artists

Somehow four magic painters came together: Winter, Spring, Summer and Autumn; agreed and argued: which of them draws better? They argued and argued and decided to choose the Red Sun as a judge: “It lives high in the sky, it has seen a lot of wonderful things in its lifetime, let it judge us.”

The sun agreed to be the judge. The painters got to work. The first volunteered to paint a picture of Zimushka-Winter.

“Only Sunshine should not look at my work,” she decided. “Must not see her until I finish.”

Winter stretched gray clouds across the sky and well, let's cover the earth with fresh fluffy snow! In one day, everything was painted around.

Fields and hillocks turned white. The river was covered with thin ice, fell silent, fell asleep, as in a fairy tale.

Winter walks in the mountains, in the valleys, walks in large soft felt boots, steps quietly, inaudibly. And she herself glances around - here and there she will correct her magical picture.

Here is a hillock in the middle of the field, the prankster took the wind from it and blew it away white hat. Need to wear it again. And over there, between the bushes, a gray hare is sneaking. It’s bad for him, the gray one: on the white snow, a predatory beast or bird will immediately notice him, you can’t hide from them anywhere.

“Get dressed, oblique, in a white fur coat,” Winter decided, “then you won’t be noticed soon in the snow.”

And Lisa Patrikeevna has no need to dress in white. She lives in a deep hole, hiding from enemies underground. She just needs to be prettier and warmer to dress up.

A wonderful fur coat was in store for her by Winter, just marvelous: all bright red, like a fire burns! The fox will lead with a fluffy tail, as if sparks will scatter on the snow.

Winter looked into the forest. “I’ll decorate it so that the Sun will admire it!”

She dressed the pines and ate in heavy snow coats; she pulled snow-white caps on them to the very eyebrows; I put on downy mittens on the branches. The forest heroes stand next to each other, stand decorously, calmly.

And below, under them, various bushes and young trees took refuge. They, like children, Winter also dressed in white fur coats.

And on the mountain ash that grows at the very edge, she threw a white veil. It worked out so well! At the ends of the branches near the mountain ash, clusters of berries hang, as if red earrings are visible from under a white coverlet.

Under the trees, Winter painted all the snow with a pattern of various footprints and footprints. Here and hare footprint: in front there are two large paw prints side by side, and behind - one after the other - two small ones; and fox - as if bred by a thread: paw to paw, so it stretches like a chain; and grey Wolf ran through the forest, also left his prints. But there is no bear trail to be seen anywhere, and no wonder: Zimushka-Zima arranged for Toptygin a cozy lair in the thicket of the forest, covered the bear with a thick snow blanket from above: sleep on your health! And he is glad to try - he does not get out of the lair. Therefore, there is no bear trail in the forest.

But not only traces of animals are visible in the snow. In a forest clearing, where green lingonberry and blueberry bushes stick out, snow, like crosses, is trampled by bird tracks. These are forest chickens - hazel grouse and black grouse - running around the clearing here, pecking at the surviving berries.

Yes, here they are: black grouse, motley grouse and black grouse. On white snow, how beautiful they all are!

The picture of the winter forest turned out well, not dead, but alive! Now a gray squirrel will jump from knot to knot, then a spotted woodpecker, sitting on the trunk of an old tree, will begin to knock out seeds from pine cone. He will put her in a crevice and beat her with her beak!

lives winter forest. Snow-covered fields and valleys live. The whole picture of the gray-haired sorceress - Winters lives. You can show it to the Sun.

The sun parted a gray cloud. He looks at the winter forest, at the valleys ... And under his gentle gaze, everything around becomes even more beautiful.

The snow flared up. Blue, red, green lights lit up on the ground, in the bushes, in the trees. And a breeze blew, shook off the frost from the branches, and in the air, too, sparkled, multi-colored lights danced.

The picture turned out great! Perhaps you can't draw better.

Astrid Lindgren

Excerpt from "Pippi Longstocking"

On the outskirts of a small Swedish town you will see a very neglected garden. And in the garden stands a dilapidated house blackened by time. It is in this house that Pippi Longstocking lives. She was nine years old, but, imagine, she lives there all alone. She doesn't have a dad or a mom, and to be honest, it even has its advantages - no one drives her to sleep just in the middle of the game and no one forces her to drink fish oil when she wants to eat candy.

Before Pippi had a father, and she loved him very much. Of course, she also once had a mother, but Pippi no longer remembers her at all. Mom died a long time ago when Pippi was still a tiny girl, lying in a stroller and screaming so terribly that no one dared to approach her. Pippi is sure that her mother now lives in heaven and looks from there through a small hole at her daughter. Therefore, Peppy often waves her hand and every time says:

“Don’t be afraid, mom, I won’t be lost!”

But Pippi remembers her father very well. He was a sea captain, his ship plowed the seas and oceans, and Peppy was never separated from her father. But then one day, during a strong storm, a huge wave washed him into the sea, and he disappeared. But Pippi was sure that one day her dad would return, she could not imagine that he had drowned. She decided that her father ended up on an island where many, many blacks live, became king there and walks around with a golden crown on his head day and night.

“My dad is a Negro king!” Not every girl can boast of such an amazing dad, ”Pippi often repeated with visible pleasure. - When dad builds a boat, he will come for me, and I will become a Negro princess. That will be great!

This old house, surrounded by neglected gardens, was bought by my father many years ago. He was going to live here with Pippi when he was old and no longer able to drive ships. But after dad disappeared into the sea, Peppy went straight to her villa "Chicken" to wait for his return there. Villa "Chicken" - that was the name of this old house. There was furniture in the rooms, utensils hung in the kitchen - it seemed that everything was specially prepared so that Pippi could settle here. One quiet summer evening, Peppy said goodbye to the sailors on her father's ship. They all loved Pippi so much, and Pippi loved them all so much that it was very sad to part.

- Farewell, guys! - said Pippi and kissed each one in turn on the forehead. Don't be afraid, I won't disappear!

She took only two things with her: a little monkey, whose name was Mr. Nilson - she received it as a gift from her father - and a large suitcase full of gold coins. All the sailors lined up on deck and looked sadly after the girl until she was out of sight. But Peppy walked with a firm step and never looked back. Mr. Nilson sat on her shoulder, and in her hand she carried a suitcase.

Tatiana Tolstaya

An excerpt from the novel "Kys"

More and more we go to the sunrise from the town. There the forests are light, the grasses are long, ant-like. In the herbs - azure flowers, tender: if you pick them, soak them, beat them, comb them, you can spin threads, weave canvases. The late mother was slow in this craft, everything fell out of her hands. He twists a thread, - cries, weaves canvases, - bursts into tears. He says everything was different before the explosion. You come, he says, to MOGOZIN - you take what you want, but you don’t like it - and you turn up your nose, not like today. They had this MOGOZIN like a Warehouse, only there was more good there, and they gave out good not on Warehouse Days, but the whole day the doors stood open.

Well, what do they give in the Warehouse? State-owned mouse sausage, mouse lard, bread flour, a feather, then felt boots, of course, tongs, canvas, stone pots: it comes out differently. Sometimes they put behind-the-scenes fires in the tuesok - somewhere they stink there, so they give them out. You have to go for good firemen yourself.

Here, exactly on the sunrise from the town, there are glue forests. Cleil is the best tree. Its trunks are light, resinous, with streaks, the leaves are carved, patterned, pawled, the spirit from them is healthy, one word - glue! The bumps on it are the size of a human head, and the nuts in them are delicious! If you soak them, of course. And then you can’t take them in your mouth. On the oldest glues, in the wilderness, fires grow. Such a delicacy: sweet, round, stringy. A ripe fire the size of a human eye will be. At night, they glow with a silver fire, as if a month had let a beam through the leaves, but during the day you won’t even notice them. They go out into the forest before dark, and when it gets dark, everyone joins hands and walks in a chain so as not to get lost. And also so that the fireman does not guess that these are, they say, people. They must be torn off quickly so that the fire does not startle and scream. Otherwise, he will warn others, and they will immediately go out. You can, of course, tear to the touch. But they don't tear. Well, how do you pick up false ones? False, when they glow, as if they are blowing red fire through themselves. It was with such and such - false - that mother at one time was poisoned. And so she would live and live.

Two hundred and thirty years and three years mother lived in the world. And didn't get old. As she was ruddy and black-haired, so her eyes were closed. It's like this: if someone didn't flinch when the Explosion happened, he doesn't grow old after that. This is their Consequence. It's like something is stuck in them. But such, read, one, two, and miscalculated. Everything in the earth is damp: whom the cat has spoiled, who has been poisoned by hares, mother here - with fires ...

And those who were born after the Explosion, those Consequences are different, - all sorts. Whose hands are as if swept with green flour, as if he was rummaging through a loaf, who has gills; another has a cock's comb or something else. And it happens that there are no Consequences, unless by old age pimples from the eyes will be trampled, otherwise in a secluded place the beard will grow up to the very knees. Or nostrils jump up on your knees.

Benedict sometimes asked his mother: why and why was there an explosion? Yeah, she didn't really know. As if people were playing and finished playing with ARUZHY. We, he says, did not have time to gasp. And cries. “Earlier,” he says, “they lived better.”

Boris Zhitkov

"Fire"

Petya lived with his mother and sisters on the top floor, and the teacher lived on the bottom floor. That time my mother went to swim with the girls. And Petya was left alone to guard the apartment.

When everyone left, Petya began to try his makeshift cannon. She was from an iron tube. Petya filled the middle with gunpowder, and there was a hole in the back to light the gunpowder. But no matter how hard Petya tried, he could not set it on fire in any way. Petya was very angry. He went into the kitchen. He put wood chips into the Stove, poured kerosene over them, put a cannon on top and lit it. "Now it will probably shoot!" The fire flared up, buzzed in the stove - and suddenly, how a shot would bang! Yes, such that all the fire was thrown out of the stove.

Petya got scared and ran out of the house. Nobody was at home, nobody heard anything. Petya ran away. He thought that maybe everything would go out on its own. And nothing faded. And it flared up even more.

The teacher was walking home and saw smoke coming from the upper windows. He ran to the post, where a button was made behind the glass. This is a call to the fire department. The teacher broke the glass and pressed the button.

The fire brigade rang. They quickly rushed to their fire trucks and rushed at full speed. They drove up to the pole, and there the teacher showed them where the fire was burning. The firefighters had a pump in their cars. The pump began to pump water, and firefighters began to fill the fire with water from rubber pipes. Firefighters put ladders to the windows and climbed into the house to find out if there were people left in the house. There was no one in the house. The firemen began to take things out.

Petya's mother came running when the whole apartment was already on fire. The policeman did not let anyone close, so as not to interfere with the firefighters.

The most necessary things did not have time to burn down, and the firemen brought them to Petya's mother. And Petya's mother kept crying and saying that, probably, Petya burned down, because he was nowhere to be seen. And Petya was ashamed, and he was afraid to approach his mother. The boys saw him and forcibly brought him.

The firefighters put out the fire so well that nothing on the lower floor burned down. The firefighters got into their cars and drove away. And the teacher let Petya's mother live with him until the house was repaired.

Kir Bulychev

An excerpt from the work "Girl from the Earth"

A brontosaurus egg was brought to us at the Moscow Zoo. The egg was found by Chilean tourists in a landslide on the banks of the Yenisei. The egg was almost round and remarkably preserved in the permafrost. When specialists began to study it, they found that the egg was completely fresh. And so it was decided to place him in a zoo incubator.

Of course, few people believed in success, but after a week, x-rays showed that the brontosaurus embryo was developing. As soon as this was announced on Intervision, scientists and correspondents began to flock to Moscow from all directions. We had to book the entire 80-story Venera Hotel on Tverskaya Street. And even then she did not fit all. Eight Turkish palaeontologists slept in my dining room, I sat in the kitchen with a journalist from Ecuador, and two correspondents for Women of Antarctica settled into Alice's bedroom.

When our mother called in the evening from Nukus, where she is building a stadium, she decided that she had come to the wrong place.

All the satellites in the world showed the egg. Egg on the side, egg on the front; brontosaurus skeletons and egg...

The congress of cosmophilologists in full force came on an excursion to the zoo. But by that time, we had already stopped access to the incubator, and philologists had to look at polar bears and Martian mantises.

On the forty-sixth day of such a crazy life, the egg shuddered. My friend Professor Yakata and I were sitting at that moment by the hood, under which the egg was kept, and drinking tea. We have already stopped believing that someone will hatch from the egg. After all, we no longer shined through it, so as not to damage our “baby”. And we could not do predictions, if only because no one before us had tried to breed brontosaurs.

So, the egg shuddered, once again ... cracked, and a black, snake-like head began to protrude through the thick leathery shell. Automatic cameras chirped. I knew that a red fire had been lit above the door of the incubator. Something very reminiscent of panic began on the territory of the zoo.

Five minutes later, everyone who was supposed to be here gathered around us, and many of those who didn’t have to be at all, but really wanted to. It immediately became very hot.

Finally, a small brontosaurus emerged from the egg.

He grew up fast. A month later, he reached two and a half meters in length, and he was transferred to a specially built pavilion. Brontosaurus roamed the fenced paddock and chewed on young bamboo shoots and bananas. Bamboo was brought by cargo rockets from India, and farmers from Malakhovka supplied us with bananas.

Joanne Rowling

Excerpt from Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone

It was the best Garrino Christmas ever. But something in the depths of his soul bothered him all day. Until he climbed into bed and got a chance to think it over quietly: the Invisibility Cloak and who sent it.

Ron, overflowing with turkey and pie and unconcerned by anything mysterious, fell asleep as soon as he closed the curtain. Harry turned and pulled the Cloak out from under the bed.

His father... this belonged to his father. He passed the matter through his fingers, soft as silk, light as air. Use it with honor, the note said.

He must test it, now. He slipped out of bed and pulled on the Cloak. Looking down at his feet, he saw only moonlight and shadows. It was a funny feeling.

Use it with honor.

Suddenly, Harry seemed to wake up. All Hogwarts is open to him in this Cloak. He was overwhelmed with excitement. He stood in darkness and silence. He can go anywhere in this, anywhere, and Filch will never know anything.

He crept out of the bedroom, down the stairs, through the living room, and out through the passage under the portrait.

Where would you like to go? With a beating heart, he stopped and thought. And then he understood. Closed Section of the Library. Now he can be there as long as he wants, as long as he needs.

The Closed Section was at the very end. Carefully stepping over the rope that separated it from the rest of the library, Harry brought the light bulb closer to read the labels on the spines.

Smooth, raised letters formed into words in languages ​​Harry didn't understand. Some had no names at all. One book had a stain that looked terribly like blood. Harry's hair stood on end at the back of his head. Maybe it only seemed to him, but there seemed to be an ominous whisper coming from the books, as if they knew that there was someone here who shouldn't be.

You have to start somewhere. Carefully placing the light bulb on the floor, he scanned the lower shelves for an interesting-looking book. The large silver-and-black volume caught his attention. He pulled it out with difficulty, because the book was very heavy, and, on his knees, opened it.

A sharp, soul-chilling cry broke the silence - the book was screaming! Harry slammed it shut, but the scream went on and on, thin, continuous, ear-splitting. He backed away and knocked over the light bulb, which immediately went out. Hearing footsteps down the outer corridor, he pushed the screeching book onto the shelf in a panic and ran. Already at the door he almost ran into Filch; Filchev's pale, wild eyes looked straight through him. Harry managed to slip under his outstretched arms and out into the corridor. The squeal of the book still rang in his ears.

Grigory Gorin

The Tale of the Sad Hedgehog

There lived a hedgehog. He was an ordinary Hedgehog - not sad, not cheerful, just a Hedgehog. He slept, like all Hedgehogs, during the day, and lived his hedgehog life at night. He almost never saw the sun - it was dark in the forest. When the Hedgehog did not sleep and the weather was cloudless, he admired the moon and the endless cold stars, magically twinkling in the night darkness.

One dark night in deep autumn, he dreamed of an Asterisk in a dream. He had never seen such a warm, gentle and dazzling creature in his life. It was very comfortable for him to be next to Asterisk, he basked in her warm and affectionate rays.

Since then, he dreamed of her very often. When he felt bad, he recalled his amazing dreams, and if he was cold from the chilly autumn wind, or scared from the hooting of a snowy owl, thinking about his little star, he suddenly warmed up or immediately became brave.

One frosty day, the Hedgehog again saw his dream in a dream, it sparkled and beckoned him with gentle and gentle warmth to itself. The hedgehog went after his little star. He did not notice how he came out of his mink, how, burning his paws, he made his way through a cold and prickly snowdrift. He could not believe his eyes - billions of snow diamonds sparkled in the brightest light from something huge, tender and warm. He recognized her! It was his star! She illuminated him with her rays, blinded his beady eyes, accustomed to pitch darkness, but he no longer saw anything but a dazzling white light. He knew that it was She, his Asterisk! He did not feel that she did not warm him at all.

The frozen body of the Hedgehog stood on icy legs frozen into icy snowdrifts in the middle of a bare oak forest. The glazed look of his blinded eyes was turned to the dark frosty sky, where the last ray of his beloved Asterisk had just disappeared. Feeling that the last drops of affectionate and tender warmth had disappeared, he realized that She, his most cherished dream, had left him without any hope. The tears that came out of the frozen beady eyes immediately turned into intricate frosty patterns.

The last thing the hedgehog heard - a deafening crystal ringing - this tiny icy heart, breaking out of the ice lump with the last blow, broke into a thousand tiny, ruby-like fragments. Infinitely gentle, warm, dazzlingly tender white light was swallowed up by a merciless, ringing emptiness, lifeless, icy darkness.

MM. Zoshchenko

Knot

Theft, my dears, is an integral and huge science.

In our time, you yourself understand, you can’t hide anything, so that’s great

live. In our time, a huge fantasy is required.

The main reason is that the public has become very cautious. The audience is such

always stands guard over its own interests. In a word, this is how he protects his property! Better eyes!

The eye, they say, can always be restored with a fear card.

Property same in no way with our poverty can not be returned.

And this is indeed true.

For this reason, the thief now went very brainy, with a special

speculation and outstanding imagination. Otherwise, with such a people, he would not

feed yourself.

Yes, for example, this autumn they entangled one of my acquaintances - a grandmother

Anisya Petrov. And after all, what a grandmother they entangled! This grandmother herself can very easily entangle anyone. And now, come on - they put a knot on her, one might say, I’m sitting right from under.

And rested, of course, with imagination and design. And the grandmother sits at the station. In

Pskov. On your own node. Waiting for the train. And the train runs at twelve o'clock at night.

Here is a grandmother early in the morning and pinned herself at the station. sat down on her own

node. And he sits. And it doesn't come off. That's why he's afraid to leave. "Do not sweep up, believes, the knot."

The grandmother sits and sits. Right there on the knot and shams and drinks water - they serve it

For Christ's sake passers-by. And for the rest of the small affairs - well, you never know - to wash or shave - the grandmother does not go, she endures. Because her knot is very

huge, it does not fit into any door with it due to its size. And to leave, I say, fearfully.

So the grandmother sits and dozes.

"With me, he thinks, they won't break the knot together. I'm not such an old woman. I sleep

I'm pretty sensitive - I'll wake up."

Our old lady began to doze. She only hears through her drowsiness, as if someone is shoving her knee in the face. Once, then another time, then a third time.

“Look how they hurt you!” the old woman thinks.

walks."

The grandmother rubbed her eyes, grunted, and suddenly sees that some

a stranger passes by her and takes a handkerchief from his pocket. He takes out a handkerchief and, together with the handkerchief, accidentally dumps a green three-ruble note on the floor.

That is, the horror of how happy the grandmother was. Plopped down, of course, after

for a three-ruble note, crushed it with her foot, then leaned over imperceptibly - as if praying to the Lord God and asking him to give a train as soon as possible. And she, of course, a three-ruble note in the paw and back to her good.

Here, of course, it’s sad to tell, but when the grandmother turned around, then

I didn't find my node. And the three-ruble note, by the way, turned out to be grossly false. And she was thrown so that the grandmother would get off her knot.

This three-ruble note was sold with difficulty by the grandmother for one and a half rubles.

V.P. Astafiev

An excerpt from the story "Belogrudka"

The village of Vereino stands on a mountain. There are two lakes under the mountain, and on their banks, an echo of a large village, huddles a small village with three houses - Zuyaty.

Between Zuyatami and Vereino there is a huge steep slope, visible for many tens of miles as a dark humpbacked island. This whole hillside is so overgrown with dense forest that people almost never go there. Yes, and how do you get on? It is worth moving a few steps away from the clover field, which is on the mountain, - and you will immediately roll head over heels down, you will fall into the deadwood lying crosswise, covered with moss, elderberry and raspberry.

Once settled in the thicket of the slope, perhaps one of the most secretive animals - the white-breasted marten. For two or three summers she lived alone, occasionally appearing at the edge of the forest. The white-breasted twitched with sensitive nostrils, caught the nasty smells of the village, and if a person approached, it pierced like a bullet into the wilderness of the forest.

On the third or fourth summer Belogrudka gave birth to kittens, small as bean pods. The mother warmed them with her body, licked each to a shine, and when the kittens grew up a little, she began to get food for them. She knew this slope very well. In addition, she was a diligent mother and provided plenty of food for kittens.

But somehow the Verinsky boys tracked down Belogrudka, went down the slope behind her, hid. The white-breasted duck meandered through the forest for a long time, waving from tree to tree, then decided that people had already left - after all, they often pass by the slope, and returned to the nest.

Several human eyes followed her. White-breasted did not feel them, because she trembled all over, clinging to the kittens, and could not pay attention to anything. She licked each of the cubs in the muzzle: they say, I am now, in a moment, - and swung out of the nest.

Finding food was getting harder and harder day by day. He was no longer near the nest, and the marten went from tree to tree, from fir to fir, to the lakes, then to the swamp, to the large swamp beyond the lake. There she attacked a simple jay and, joyful, rushed to her nest, carrying in her teeth a red bird with a loose blue wing.

The nest was empty. The white-breasted bird dropped its prey from its teeth, rushed up the spruce, then down, then up again, to the nest cunningly hidden in the dense spruce branches.

There were no kittens. If Belogrudka knew how to scream, she would scream.

The kittens are gone.

The white-breasted woman examined everything in order and found that people were trampling around the spruce and a man was awkwardly climbing the tree, peeling off the bark, breaking off the knots, leaving a pungent smell of sweat and dirt in the folds of the bark.

By evening, Belogrudka accurately tracked down that her cubs had been taken to the village. At night, she also found the house to which they had been taken.

Until dawn, she rushed about near the house: from the roof to the fence, from the fence to the roof. For hours she sat on the bird cherry tree, under the window, listening to see if the kittens would squeak.

But in the yard a chain rattled and a dog barked hoarsely. The owner went out of the house several times, angrily shouted at her. The white-breasted clump clung to the bird cherry.

Now every night she sneaked up to the house, watched, watched, and the dog rattled and raged in the yard.

Every year, schools hold a reading competition for Victory Day. It is sometimes difficult to find a heartfelt poem about the war that would be liked by both students, parents, and teachers at the same time. We offer you a selection of touching poems about the war for a reading competition for schoolchildren.

As long as the memory lives on!
Chebotareva Z.

The volleys of our guns have died down for a long time,
And in the funnel from the bomb there is grass-ant ...
But the war was not forgotten by harsh people
And laugh through tears
After all, the memory is alive!

They remember campaigns and distant countries,
And simple, from the heart, the people of the word.
Remember the faces of friends who left so early.
Their words and smiles -
After all, the memory is alive!

They remember the spring of 1945...
Then my head was spinning with happiness!
Those who died on campaigns did not recognize her,
But their friends remember everything
After all, the memory is alive!

This memory goes deeper and deeper
And rustles on the branches, green foliage ...
Her time will never be drowned out by running!
Because the soul is young
As long as the memory lives on!

Robert Rozhdestvensky

BALLAD ABOUT A LITTLE MAN

On a mercilessly small earth
there lived a small man.
He had a small service.
And a very small portfolio.
He received a small salary...
And one day - on a beautiful morning -
knocked on his window
small, it seemed, war ...
They gave him a small machine gun.
They gave him small boots.
The helmet was issued small
and a small - in size - overcoat.
... And when he fell - ugly, wrong,
twisting his mouth in an attacking cry,
there was not enough marble on the whole earth,
to knock out the guy in full growth!

Remember! Through the centuries, through the years - remember! About those who will never come again - remember!
Excerpt from "Requiem" by Robert Rozhdestvensky

Remember! Through the centuries, through the years - remember!
About those who will never come again - remember!
Do not Cry! Keep moans, bitter moans in your throat.
Be worthy of the memory of the fallen! Forever worthy!
Bread and song, dream and poems, spacious life.
Every second, every breath, be worthy!
People! As long as hearts are beating, remember!
At what cost is happiness won, please remember!
Sending your song in flight - remember!
Tell your children about them so that they remember!
Tell the children of children about them so that they also remember!
At all times of the immortal earth, remember!
Leading ships to the twinkling stars - remember the dead!
Meet the quivering spring, people of the earth.
Kill the war, curse the war, people of the earth!
Carry the dream through the years and fill it with life! ..
But about those who will never come again - we conjure - remember!

POEMS ABOUT THE POSTMAN

Tatiana Chernovskaya

She's not fifteen, she's a girl.
She is short and very thin.
letter carrier, postman,
Nicknamed Nyurka-trouble.

In the heat and slush, in the blizzard and cold
With a leather bag at the ready
You need to deliver mail to Nyurka
Five villages around.

Two younger brothers at home
Mother has been sick for almost a year.
Thank God, my father writes from the front -
They wait and believe that he will come.

He will come and everything will be as before
Like yesterday, far, far away.
Do not deprive only, God, of hope ...
And it's time to go back to work.

Children - potatoes in the oven,
In the morning, she was with a bag at the ready.
And what is starving ... It's easier to run
Five villages around.

In the villages - old people and children,
Women are in the field, they sow, they reap.
The postman will be seen in the distance
And they wait with heartfelt anxiety.

The triangle is alive! Luck!
If a gray official envelope -
Shut up, scream, cry...
And the white light will fade in the eyes ...

Pinch the girl's heart
From human grief and troubles ...
This bag is too heavy
If there is out of trouble hello.

Lead black - a funeral,
Burning bitter succession.
Letter carrier, postman
Without guilt they gave the name - Trouble.

Still young, girl -
Only the braids are full of gray hair.
letter carrier, postman,
Carrying news from the war.

GRANDFATHER'S STORY

Andrey Paroshin

Grandpa Zhenya told me yesterday:
The partisan detachment was surrounded.
They have eighteen grenades left,
One pistol and one machine gun.

More and more in the detachment of dead soldiers,
The Nazis are squeezing the ring tighter and tighter, -
They are behind the bushes, they are behind the stones.
And my grandfather shouted: “The Motherland is with us!”.

And everyone ran towards the enemy,
And they began to throw grenades on the run.
Everyone fought bravely, forgetting about death, -
And so, they managed to make a breakthrough.

Through the forest through the swamp they left:
And then grandfather was awarded a medal.

Andrey Dementiev

BALLAD OF A MOTHER

Mother has aged for thirty years,
And there is no news from the son and no.

But she keeps waiting
Because he believes, because the mother.

And what does she hope for?
Many years have passed since the end of the war.

Many years since everyone came back.
Except the dead that lie in the ground.

How many of them in that distant village,
Bearless boys, not come!

... Once they sent to the village in the spring
Documentary film about the war.

Everyone came to the cinema - both old and small,
Who knew the war and who did not know.

Before the bitter memory of man
Hatred flowed like a river.

It was hard to remember...
Suddenly, from the screen, the son looked at his mother.

The mother recognized her son at the same moment,
And a mother's cry went:

Alexei! Alyoshenka! Son!
Alexei! Alyoshenka! Son!
Alexei! Alyoshenka! Son!
As if her son could hear her.

He rushed out of the trench into battle.
His mother got up to cover him.

Everyone was afraid that he would suddenly fall,
But through the years, the son rushed forward.

Alexei! - shouted fellow countrymen,
- Alexey, - they asked, - Run ...

The frame has changed. son survived.
He asks the mother to repeat about her son.

He asks the mother to repeat about her son.
Asks the mother to repeat about her son ...

And again he runs on the attack,
Alive and well, not wounded, not killed.

Alexey, Alyoshenka, son.
Alexey, Alyoshenka, son.
Alexey, Alyoshenka, son.
As if her son could hear her.

At home, everything seemed to her like a movie.
Everything was waiting - just about now through the window,

In the midst of the disturbing silence
Her son will knock from the war.

Konstantin Simonov

WAIT FOR ME

Wait for me and I will come back.
Just wait a lot
Wait for sadness
yellow rain,
Wait for the snow to come
Wait when it's hot
Wait when others are not expected
Forgetting yesterday.
Wait when from distant places
Letters will not come
Wait until you get bored
To all who are waiting together.

Wait for me and I will come back,
don't wish well
To everyone who knows by heart
It's time to forget.
Let the son and mother believe
That there is no me
Let friends get tired of waiting
They sit by the fire
Drink bitter wine
For the soul...
Wait. And along with them
Don't rush to drink.

Wait for me and I will come back,
All deaths out of spite.
Who did not wait for me, let him
He will say: - Lucky.
Do not understand those who did not wait for them,
Like in the middle of a fire
Waiting for your
You saved me
How I survived, we will know
Only you and I -
You just knew how to wait
Like no one else.

MONUMENT

Georgy Lvovich Rublev (1916-1955)

It was in May, at dawn.
There was a battle at the walls of the Reichstag.
I noticed a German girl
Our soldier on the dusty pavement.

At the pillar, trembling, she stood,
There was fear in his blue eyes.
And pieces of whistling metal
Death and torment sowed around.

Then he remembered how saying goodbye in the summer
He kissed his daughter.
Maybe the girl's father
He shot his own daughter.

But then, in Berlin, under fire
A fighter crawled, and shielding his body
Girl in a short white dress
Carefully removed from the fire.

And, stroking with a gentle hand,
He dropped her to the ground.
They say that in the morning Marshal Konev
Stalin reported this.

How many children have their childhood returned
Gave joy and spring
Privates of the Soviet Army
The people who won the war!

And in Berlin, on a festive date,
Was erected to stand for centuries,
Monument to the Soviet soldier
With a rescued girl in her arms.

It stands as a symbol of our glory,
Like a beacon glowing in the dark.
It is he, the soldier of my state,
Protects peace throughout the earth.

NURSE

Alexander Byvshev

young nurse,
Our friend Lieutenant.
Pigtail under the cap.
(She would have looked like a white bow.)

And where does this power come from?
In a fragile girl was taken?
How many from the field carried
Explosions are not afraid.

I remember a crazy bullet
Was severely wounded in the shoulder
I hear a voice above me:
"Darling, be patient..."

Bandaged hastily,
The evening battle subsided
And from the tenderness of the tide
Somehow the pain subsided.

Fireworks died down... Oh, Rita.
Would have lived if not for the war ...
Me from the past with granite
She smiles.

Julia Drunina "Will you come back"

Mashenka, signalman, was dying
In the hands of my helpless.
And in the trench it smelled of melted snow,
And an artillery raid verse.
There was no wagon from the sanrota,
Our paramedic called someone's mother.

Oh, shoulder strap crumpled strips
On thin girls' shoulders!
And the face - native, wax,
Under the turban of a wet bandage! ..

A projectile hissed over his head,
A black pillar shot up from a bush...

The girl in the overcoat left
From war, from life, from me.
Dig a grave again in silence
Ringing with frozen clods...

Wait for me a little, Masha!
I'm also unlikely to survive...

Then I swore by our friendship:
If I only go back
If this miracle happens
Until death, until the last days,
I will always, everywhere and everywhere
The pain of the lines to remind of her -
The girl who died quietly
In the hands of my helpless.

And smell the front - melted snow,
Blood and fires my verse.

Only we are fellow soldiers of the fallen,
They, the silent ones, are free to resurrect.
I won't let you disappear, Masha, -
Song you will return from the war!

Surkov Alexey

"MORNING VICTORY"

Where the grass is damp from dew and from blood,
Where the pupils of machine guns glare fiercely,
In full growth, above the trench of the front edge,
The victorious soldier rose.

The heart beat against the ribs intermittently, often.
Silence ... Silence ... Not in a dream - in reality.
And the infantryman said: - Get rid of it! Basta!-
And noticed a snowdrop in a moat.

And in the soul yearning for light and affection,
The joy of the former melodious stream came to life.
And the soldier bent down and to the shot helmet
Carefully adjusted the flower.

Came to life again in memory were alive -
Moscow suburbs in the snow and on fire Stalingrad.
For the first time in four unthinkable years,
Like a child, the soldier cried.

So stood the infantryman, laughing and sobbing,
With a boot trampling a prickly wattle fence.
Behind the shoulders was a young dawn,
Foreshadowing a sunny day.

"That war died down many springs ago..."

Olga Podchinenova

That war died down many springs ago,
An old soldier is crying on his knees.
A hardened hand strokes dark granite,
Where under the gray slab their battalion lies.

Golden from the sun on the chest of the order,
The war handed them out with a steel hand,
Generously filling every wound with lead,
And she screamed out of pain with her twisted mouth.

How many innocent lives were taken by that war,
How many burned down in tanks and died in the fields,
How many of them did not live, only the earth knows,
Laid down their lives for you and me

To love and live. How they believed in us!
To make our children happy now,
So that the morning is born in the blue of silence,
So as not to betray the memory of that distant war.

The old boy has so much pain in his eyes
As on old roads - on wrinkles a tear.
The battalion commander is torn again to attack from the granite,
A soldier does not leave the battle with his heart ...

How hard it was for those who won the war.
There are so few of them left, who defended the country,
Only so that we can live with you today.
I bow to the ground to the veterans of the Great.

Unknown Soldier
Yu.Korinets

The stars are burning bright
And in the Kremlin garden
Unknown Soldier
Sleeping in front of everyone.

Above the granite slab
The eternal light is inextinguishable.
The whole country is an orphan
Leaned over him.

He didn't turn in the machine
And my pilot.
Unknown Soldier
Fell in a fierce battle.

Unknown Soldier,
Someone's son or brother
He has never been from the war
Won't go back.

The stars are burning bright
And in the Kremlin garden
Unknown Soldier
Sleeping in front of everyone.

Julia Drunina "Soldier's everyday life"

Just got back from the front line
Wet, cold and angry
And there is no one in the dugout,
And, of course, the stove goes out.

So tired - do not raise your hands,
No time for firewood - I'll warm myself under my overcoat.
I lay down, but I hear that again
They are hitting our trenches with shrapnel.

I run out of the dugout into the night,
And a flame rushed towards me.
To meet me - those who help
I must calm hands.

And for the fact that again until the morning
Death will crawl with me,
In passing: "Well done, sister!" -
Comrades will shout to me as a reward.

Yes, a shining battalion commander
Hands will stretch out to me after the fight:
- Sergeant, dear! How glad I am
That you are alive again!

And where
Suddenly strength comes
At the hour when
In the soul of black-black? ..
If I
Was not the daughter of Russia,
I would have given up a long time ago
Dropped her hands
At forty-one.
Do you remember?
defensive ditches,
Like exposed nerves
Zmeilis near Moscow.
funeral
wounds,
Ashes...
Memory,
soul to me
Don't tear the war
Only time
I don't know better
And sharper
To the Motherland of love.
Only love
Give people strength
In the middle of a roaring fire.
If I
Didn't believe in Russia
then she
Wouldn't believe in me.

(Yu. Drunina)

TO THE YEVPATORIAN LANDING

Pink Haze Tamarisk
Tightened the scars of old wounds
In the place where he landed at risk
On the silent shore our landing.

Yes, the strength was not enough!
Scattered in a storm wave
But the bayonets are in the hands, and there are grenades -
Enough for the enemy.

Words are useless, oaths are superfluous,
You decide to fight to the end...
Vests and black jackets
Protected souls and hearts.

Barely smoldering life among the ruins,
The city was asleep, only the surf rumbled.
Neither the enemies nor the inhabitants knew
The fact that very soon the battle will break out.

What will the Germans begin to drape in their underwear,
Feeling the hour of death that has come,
That they and their Gestapo will burn,
Without leaving the punishment this time.

To them, who captured Europe with a bang,
With marches, with fanfares, with revelry,
There will suddenly be little space in the City,
But it was only forty-second.

How scared they were that night
And neither schnapps nor rum warmed ...
Ghost of the Merciless Melee
He hung with the sword of Damocles.

Rushed through the maze of streets
Black death a thousand devils...
There was a landing, and overtook the bullets
In the panic of the fled patrols.

It was a win without a doubt
Only the forces of the enemy are great...
Three days in complete encirclement.
Fought, dying, sailors.

Miraculously, but managed in the quarry
The detachment thinned out to retreat.
We must remember them by name.
The lives of the guys who laid here.

And forget - at the sea cut
Firmly established on the sand
Three sailors, three sharp blades,
Merged in a desperate throw.

Here it is, the City, sleeping peacefully, close,
Keeps a grateful memory
Pink Haze Tamarisk
And rain-washed granite.

Sergey Ovcharenko

Reflection of the vanished years

Relief of the yoke of life,

Eternal truths unfading light -

Relentless search is a pledge,

The joy of each new shift,

Indication of future roads -

This is a book. Long live the book!

Pure joys bright source,

Fixing a happy moment

Best friend if you are alone,

This is a book. Long live the book!

Having emptied the bowler hat, Vanya wiped it dry with a crust. He wiped the spoon with the same crust, ate the crust, stood up, bowed sedately to the giants and said, lowering his eyelashes:

Much grateful. Much pleased with you.

Maybe you still want?

No, fed up.

Otherwise, we can put you another bowler hat, ”said Gorbunov, winking, not without boasting. - It means nothing to us. What about a shepherd?

It doesn’t fit into me anymore, ”Vanya said shyly, and his blue eyes suddenly shot a quick, mischievous look from under his lashes.

If you don't want it, whatever you want. Your will. We have such a rule: we do not force anyone, - said Bidenko, known for his justice.

But the vain Gorbunov, who liked to have all people admire the life of scouts, said:

Well, Vanya, how did our grub seem to you?

Good grub, - said the boy, putting a spoon into the pot with the handle down and collecting bread crumbs from the Suvorov Onslaught newspaper, spread out instead of a tablecloth.

Right, good? Gorbunov perked up. - You, brother, will not find such grub in anyone in the division. The famous grub. You, brother, the main thing, hold on to us, to the scouts. You will never get lost with us. Will you hold on to us?

I will, - the boy said cheerfully.

That's right, you won't get lost. We will wash you in the bath. We'll cut your patches. We will fix some uniform so that you have a proper military appearance.

Will you take me on reconnaissance, uncle?

Yves intelligence will take you. Let's make you a famous spy.

I, uncle, am small. I'll crawl through everywhere, - Vanya said with joyful readiness. - I know every bush around here.

This is also expensive.

Will you teach me how to shoot from a machine gun?

From what. The time will come - we will teach.

I would, uncle, just shoot once, ”Vanya said, looking greedily at the machine guns swaying on their belts from the incessant cannon fire.

Shoot. Don't be afraid. This will not follow. We will teach you all military science. Our first duty, of course, is to credit you for all kinds of allowances.

How is it, uncle?

It's very simple, brother. Sergeant Egorov will report about you to the lieutenant

gray-haired. Lieutenant Sedykh will report to the commander of the battery, Captain Yenakiev, Captain Yenakiev orders you to be enlisted in the order. From that, then, all kinds of allowances will go to you: clothing, welds, money. Do you understand?

Understood, uncle.

This is how it is done with us scouts… Wait a minute! Where are you going to?

Wash the dishes, dude. Mother always ordered us to wash the dishes after herself, and then clean the closet.

You gave the right order,” Gorbunov said sternly. “The same is true in military service.

There are no porters in the military service, - the fair Bidenko pointed out instructively.

However, wait a little longer to wash the dishes, we will drink tea now, ”said Gorbunov smugly. - Do you respect drinking tea?

I respect, - said Vanya.

Well, you are doing the right thing. Here, among the scouts, this is how it is supposed to be: as we eat, so immediately drink tea. It is forbidden! Bidenko said. “We drink, of course, over the top,” he added indifferently. - We do not consider this.

Soon a large copper kettle appeared in the tent - a subject of special pride for the scouts, it is also the source of the eternal envy of the rest of the batteries.

It turned out that the scouts really did not consider sugar. Silent Bidenko untied his duffel bag and put a huge handful of refined sugar on the Suvorov Onslaught. Before Vanya had even blinked an eye, Gorbunov sloshed two large piles of sugar into his mug, however, noticing an expression of delight on the boy's face, he sloshed a third. Know, they say, us scouts!

Vanya grabbed a tin mug with both hands. He even closed his eyes in pleasure. He felt like he was in an extraordinary, fairy-tale world. Everything around was fabulous. And this tent, as if illuminated by the sun on a cloudy day, and the roar of a close battle, and good giants throwing handfuls of refined sugar, and the mysterious “all kinds of allowances” promised to him - clothing, welding, money, - and even the words “pork stew”, in large black letters printed on the mug.

Like? asked Gorbunov, proudly admiring the pleasure with which the boy sipped the tea with carefully outstretched lips.

Vanya could not even sensibly answer this question. His lips were busy fighting the tea, hot as fire. His heart was full of stormy joy because he would stay with the scouts, with these wonderful people who promise to cut his hair, equip him, teach him how to shoot from a machine gun.

All the words jumbled in his head. He only nodded his head gratefully, raised his eyebrows high like a house and rolled his eyes, expressing by this the highest degree pleasure and gratitude.

(In Kataev "Son of the Regiment")

If you think that I am a good student, you are wrong. I study hard. For some reason, everyone thinks that I am capable, but lazy. I don't know if I'm capable or not. But only I know for sure that I'm not lazy. I sit on tasks for three hours.

Here, for example, now I'm sitting and I want to solve the problem with all my might. And she does not dare. I tell my mom

Mom, I can't do it.

Don't be lazy, says mom. - Think carefully, and everything will work out. Just think carefully!

She's leaving on business. And I take my head with both hands and say to her:

Think head. Think carefully… “Two pedestrians went from point A to point B…” Head, why don't you think? Well, head, well, think, please! Well, what are you worth!

A cloud floats outside the window. It is as light as fluff. Here it stopped. No, it floats on.

Head, what are you thinking? Aren `t you ashamed!!! “Two pedestrians went from point A to point B ...” Luska, probably, also left. She is already walking. If she had approached me first, I would have forgiven her, of course. But is she suitable, such a pest ?!

"...From point A to point B..." No, it won't fit. On the contrary, when I go out into the yard, she will take Lena by the arm and will whisper with her. Then she will say: "Len, come to me, I have something." They will leave, and then they will sit on the windowsill and laugh and gnaw on seeds.

“... Two pedestrians went from point A to point B ...” And what will I do? .. And then I will call Kolya, Petka and Pavlik to play rounders. And what will she do? Yeah, she'll put on a Three Fat Men record. Yes, so loudly that Kolya, Petka and Pavlik will hear and run to ask her to let them listen. They listened a hundred times, everything is not enough for them! And then Lyuska will close the window, and they will all listen to the record there.

"... From point A to point ... to point ..." And then I'll take it and shoot something right into her window. Glass - ding! - and shatter. Let him know.

So. I'm tired of thinking. Think do not think - the task does not work. Just awful, what a difficult task! I'll walk around for a bit and start thinking again.

I closed my book and looked out the window. Lyuska alone was walking in the yard. She jumped into hopscotch. I went outside and sat down on a bench. Lucy didn't even look at me.

Earring! Vitka! Lucy immediately screamed. - Let's go to play bast shoes!

The Karmanov brothers looked out the window.

We have a throat, both brothers said hoarsely. - They won't let us in.

Lena! Lucy screamed. - Linen! Come out!

Instead of Lena, her grandmother looked out and threatened Lyuska with her finger.

Pavlik! Lucy screamed.

Nobody appeared at the window.

Pe-et-ka-ah! Luska perked up.

Girl, what are you yelling at?! Someone's head popped out of the window. - A sick person is not allowed to rest! There is no rest from you! - And the head stuck back into the window.

Luska furtively looked at me and blushed like a cancer. She tugged at her pigtail. Then she took the thread off her sleeve. Then she looked at the tree and said:

Lucy, let's go to the classics.

Come on, I said.

We jumped into the hopscotch and I went home to solve my problem.

As soon as I sat down at the table, my mother came:

Well, what's the problem?

Does not work.

But you've been sitting on it for two hours already! It's just awful what it is! They ask the children some puzzles!.. Well, let's show your problem! Maybe I can do it? I did finish college. So. “Two pedestrians went from point A to point B ...” Wait, wait, this task is familiar to me! Listen, you and your dad decided it last time! I remember perfectly!

How? - I was surprised. - Really? Oh, really, this is the forty-fifth task, and we were given the forty-sixth.

At this, my mother got very angry.

It's outrageous! Mom said. - It's unheard of! This mess! Where is your head?! What is she thinking about?!

(Irina Pivovarova “What is my head thinking about”)

Irina Pivovarova. Spring rain

I didn't want to study yesterday. It was so sunny outside! Such a warm yellow sun! Such branches swayed outside the window! .. I wanted to stretch out my hand and touch every sticky green leaf. Oh, how your hands will smell! And the fingers stick together - you can't pull them apart... No, I didn't want to learn my lessons.

I went outside. The sky above me was fast. Clouds hurried along it somewhere, and sparrows chirped terribly loudly in the trees, and a big fluffy cat warmed up on a bench, and it was so good that spring!

I walked in the yard until the evening, and in the evening mom and dad went to the theater, and I went to bed without doing my homework.

The morning was dark, so dark that I did not want to get up at all. That's how it always is. If the sun is shining, I immediately jump up. I dress quickly. And coffee is delicious, and mom does not grumble, and dad jokes. And when the morning is like today, I barely get dressed, my mother pushes me and gets angry. And when I have breakfast, dad makes me remarks that I sit crookedly at the table.

On the way to school, I remembered that I had not done a single lesson, and this made me even worse. Without looking at Lyuska, I sat down at my desk and took out my textbooks.

Vera Evstigneevna entered. The lesson has begun. Now I will be called.

Sinitsyn, to the blackboard!

I started. Why should I go to the board?

I didn't learn, I said.

Vera Evstigneevna was surprised and gave me a deuce.

Why do I feel so bad in the world?! I'd rather take it and die. Then Vera Evstigneevna will regret that she gave me a deuce. And mom and dad will cry and tell everyone:

“Oh, why did we ourselves go to the theater, and they left her all alone!”

Suddenly they pushed me in the back. I turned around. They put a note in my hand. I unrolled a narrow long paper ribbon and read:

“Lucy!

Don't despair!!!

Two is rubbish!!!

You'll fix two!

I will help you! Let's be friends with you! It's just a secret! Not a word to anyone!!!

Yalo-quo-kyl.

It was as if something warm had been poured into me. I was so happy that I even laughed. Luska looked at me, then at the note and proudly turned away.

Did someone write this to me? Or maybe this note is not for me? Maybe she is Lucy? But on reverse side standing: LYUSA SINITSYNA.

What a wonderful note! I have never received such wonderful notes in my life! Well, of course, a deuce is nothing! What are you talking about?! I'll just fix the two!

I re-read twenty times:

"Let's be friends with you..."

Well, of course! Sure, let's be friends! Let's be friends with you!! Please! Very happy! I really love it when they want to be friends with me! ..

But who is writing this? Some kind of YALO-QUO-KYL. Incomprehensible word. I wonder what it means? And why does this YALO-QUO-KYL want to be friends with me?.. Maybe I'm beautiful after all?

I looked at the desk. There was nothing pretty.

He probably wanted to be friends with me because I'm good. What, I'm bad, right? Of course it's good! After all, no one wants to be friends with a bad person!

To celebrate, I nudged Luska with my elbow.

Lucy, and with me one person wants to be friends!

Who? Lucy immediately asked.

I don't know who. It's kind of unclear here.

Show me, I'll figure it out.

Honestly, won't you tell anyone?

Honestly!

Luska read the note and pursed her lips:

Some idiot wrote it! I couldn't say my real name.

Or maybe he's shy?

I looked around the whole class. Who could write the note? Well, who? .. It would be nice, Kolya Lykov! He is the smartest in our class. Everyone wants to be friends with him. But I have so many triplets! No, he is unlikely.

Or maybe Yurka Seliverstov wrote this? .. No, we are already friends with him. He would send me a note for no reason!

At recess, I went out into the corridor. I stood at the window and waited. It would be nice if this YALO-QUO-KYL made friends with me right away!

Pavlik Ivanov came out of the classroom and immediately went to me.

So, it means that Pavlik wrote it? It just wasn't enough!

Pavlik ran up to me and said:

Sinitsyna, give me ten kopecks.

I gave him ten kopecks to get rid of it as soon as possible. Pavlik immediately ran to the buffet, and I stayed at the window. But no one else came up.

Suddenly Burakov began to walk past me. I thought he was looking at me in a strange way. He stood next to her and looked out the window. So, it means that Burakov wrote the note?! Then I'd better leave now. I can't stand this Burakov!

The weather is terrible,” said Burakov.

I didn't have time to leave.

Yes, the weather is bad, I said.

The weather can't be worse, - said Burakov.

Terrible weather, I said.

Here Burakov took an apple out of his pocket and bit off half with a crunch.

Burakov, give me a bite, - I could not stand it.

And it is bitter, - said Burakov and went down the corridor.

No, he didn't write the note. And thank God! You won't find another one like this in the whole world!

I looked at him contemptuously and went to class. I went in and freaked out. Written on the blackboard was:

SECRET!!! YALO-QUO-KYL + SINITSYNA = LOVE!!! NOT A WORD TO ANYONE!

In the corner, Luska was whispering with the girls. When I entered, they all stared at me and began to giggle.

I grabbed a rag and rushed to wipe the board.

Then Pavlik Ivanov jumped up to me and whispered in my ear:

I wrote you a note.

You lie, not you!

Then Pavlik laughed like a fool and yelled at the whole class:

Oh, die! Why be friends with you?! All freckled like a cuttlefish! Silly tit!

And then, before I had time to look back, Yurka Seliverstov jumped up to him and hit this blockhead with a wet rag right on the head. Peacock howled:

Ah well! I'll tell everyone! I’ll tell everyone, everyone, everyone about her, how she receives notes! And I'll tell everyone about you! You sent her a note! - And he ran out of the classroom with a stupid cry: - Yalo-quo-kyl! Yalo-quo-kul!

Lessons are over. Nobody approached me. Everyone quickly collected their textbooks, and the class was empty. We were alone with Kolya Lykov. Kolya still couldn't tie his shoelace.

The door creaked. Yurka Seliverstov stuck his head into the classroom, looked at me, then at Kolya, and left without saying anything.

But what if? Suddenly it's still Kolya wrote? Is it Kolya? What happiness if Kolya! My throat immediately dried up.

Kohl, please tell me, - I barely squeezed out of myself, - it's not you, by chance ...

I did not finish, because I suddenly saw how Colin's ears and neck were filled with paint.

Oh you! Kolya said without looking at me. - I thought you... And you...

Kolya! I screamed. - So I...

Chatterbox you, that's who, - said Kolya. - Your tongue is like a pomelo. And I don't want to be friends with you anymore. What else was missing!

Kolya finally got through the string, got up and left the classroom. And I sat down in my seat.

I won't go anywhere. Outside the window is such a terrible rain. And my fate is so bad, so bad that it can't get any worse! So I will sit here until the night. And I will sit at night. One in a dark classroom, one in an entire dark school. So I need it.

Aunt Nyura came in with a bucket.

Go home, dear, - said Aunt Nyura. - Mom was tired of waiting at home.

No one was waiting for me at home, Aunt Nyura, - I said and trudged out of the classroom.

Bad fate! Lucy is no longer my friend. Vera Evstigneevna gave me a deuce. Kolya Lykov... I didn't even want to think about Kolya Lykov.

I slowly put on my coat in the locker room and, barely dragging my feet, went out into the street ...

It was wonderful, the best spring rain in the world!!!

Cheerful wet passers-by ran along the street with their collars up!!!

And on the porch, right in the rain, stood Kolya Lykov.

Come on, he said.

And we went.

(Irina Pivovarova "Spring Rain")

The front was far from the village of Nechaev. The Nechaev collective farmers did not hear the roar of the guns, did not see how the planes were beating in the sky and how the glow of fires blazed at night where the enemy was crossing Russian soil. But from where the front was, refugees were coming through Nechaevo. They dragged sleighs with bundles, hunched under the weight of bags and sacks. Clinging to the dress of their mothers, the children walked and got stuck in the snow. Homeless people stopped, warmed themselves in the huts and moved on.
Once, at dusk, when the shadow from the old birch stretched all the way to the barn, there was a knock on the door to the Shalihins.
The nimble red-haired girl Taiska rushed to the side window, buried her nose in the thaw, and both of her pigtails lifted up merrily.
- Two aunts! she screamed. - One young, in a scarf! And another very old woman, with a wand! And yet ... look - a girl!
Grusha, Taiska's older sister, put down the stocking she was knitting and also went to the window.
“Really, a girl. In a blue hood...
“Then go open it,” said the mother. – What are you waiting for?
Grusha pushed Thaiska:
- Go, what are you doing! All seniors should?
Thaiska ran to open the door. People entered, and the hut smelled of snow and frost.
While the mother was talking to the women, while she was asking where they were from, where they were going, where the Germans were and where the front was, Grusha and Taiska looked at the girl.
- Look, in boots!
- And the stocking is torn!
“Look, she’s clutching her bag, she doesn’t even open her fingers. What does she have there?
- And you ask.
- And you yourself ask.
At this time, he appeared from Romanok Street. The frost hit his cheeks. Red as a tomato, he stopped in front of a strange girl and stared at her. I even forgot to cover my legs.
And the girl in the blue bonnet was sitting motionless on the edge of the bench.
With her right hand, she clutched a yellow handbag that hung over her shoulder to her chest. She silently looked somewhere at the wall and seemed not to see or hear anything.
The mother poured hot soup for the refugees and cut off pieces of bread.
- Oh, yes, and the unfortunate ones! she sighed. - And it’s not easy on your own, and the child is toiling ... Is this your daughter?
- No, - the woman answered, - a stranger.
“They lived on the same street,” the old woman added.
Mother was surprised:
- Alien? And where are your relatives, girl?
The girl looked at her gloomily and said nothing.
“She has no one,” the woman whispered, “the whole family died: her father is at the front, and her mother and brother are here.

Killed...
The mother looked at the girl and could not come to her senses.
She looked at her light coat, which must have been blown through by the wind, at her torn stockings, at her thin neck, plaintively whitening from under the blue bonnet...
Killed. All killed! But the girl is alive. And she is the only one in the world!
The mother approached the girl.
- What is your name, daughter? she asked kindly.
“Valya,” the girl replied indifferently.
“Valya… Valentina…” the mother repeated thoughtfully. - Valentine...
Seeing that the women took up the knapsacks, she stopped them:
- Stay overnight tonight. It’s already late in the yard, and the snow has gone - look how it sweeps! And leave in the morning.
The women stayed. Mother made beds for tired people. She arranged a bed for the girl on a warm couch - let her warm herself well. The girl undressed, took off her blue bonnet, poked her head into the pillow, and sleep immediately overcame her. So, when grandfather came home in the evening, his usual place on the couch was occupied, and that night he had to lie down on the chest.
After dinner, everyone calmed down very soon. Only the mother tossed and turned in her bed and could not sleep.
She got up in the night, turned on a small blue lamp, and quietly walked over to the couch. The weak light of the lamp illuminated the girl's tender, slightly flushed face, large fluffy eyelashes, dark brown hair, scattered over a colorful pillow.
"You poor orphan!" mother sighed. - As soon as you opened your eyes to the light, and how much grief fell on you! For such a small one!
The mother stood near the girl for a long time and kept thinking about something. I took her boots from the floor, looked - thin, wet. Tomorrow this little girl will put them on and go somewhere again... But where?
Early, early, when it was a little light in the windows, the mother got up and lit the stove. Grandfather got up too: he did not like to lie down for a long time. It was quiet in the hut, only sleepy breathing was heard and Romanok was snoring on the stove. In this silence, by the light of a small lamp, mother spoke softly to grandfather.
“Let's take the girl, father,” she said. - I'm so sorry for her!
Grandfather put down the felt boots he was mending, raised his head and looked thoughtfully at his mother.
- Take the girl? .. Will it be okay? he replied. We are rural, and she is from the city.
"Isn't it all the same, father?" There are people in the city and people in the countryside. After all, she is an orphan! Our Taiska will have a girlfriend. On the next winter going to school together...
Grandfather came up and looked at the girl:
– Nu that same … Look. You know better. Let's just take it. Just look, don't cry with her later!
- Eh! .. Maybe I won’t cry.
Soon the refugees also got up and began to pack for the journey. But when they wanted to wake the girl, the mother stopped them:
- Wait, you don't have to wake up. Leave Valentine with me! If there are any relatives, tell me: he lives in Nechaev, with Darya Shalikhina. And I had three guys - well, there will be four. Let's live!
The women thanked the hostess and left. But the girl remained.
“Here I have another daughter,” said Daria Shalikhina thoughtfully, “daughter Valentinka ... Well, we will live.
So a new man appeared in the village of Nechaev.

(Lyubov Voronkova "Girl from the City")

Not remembering how she had left the house, Assol was already running to the sea, caught up by an irresistible

wind-blown events; at the first corner she stopped almost exhausted; her legs were wobbly,

breath broke and went out, consciousness was held by a thread. Beside myself with fear of losing

will, she stamped her foot and recovered. At times, either the roof or the fence was hidden from her

Scarlet Sails; then, fearing that they might have vanished like a mere phantom, she hurried

overcome the painful obstacle and, seeing the ship again, stopped with relief

take a breath.

Meanwhile in Kapern there was such confusion, such excitement, such

total confusion, which will not yield to the effect of the famous earthquakes. Never before

big ship did not approach this shore; the ship had those very sails, the name

which sounded like a mockery; now they clearly and irrefutably burned with

the innocence of a fact that refutes all the laws of being and common sense. Men,

women, children in a hurry rushed to the shore, who was in what; residents spoke to

yard to yard, jumping on each other, screaming and falling; soon formed by the water

crowd, and Assol quickly ran into this crowd.

While she was gone, her name flew among the people with nervous and gloomy anxiety, with

vicious fear. Men spoke more; strangled, snake hiss

dumbfounded women sobbed, but if one of them began to crack - poison

got into his head. As soon as Assol appeared, everyone was silent, everyone moved away from

her, and she was left alone in the middle of the emptiness of the sultry sand, bewildered, ashamed, happy, with a face no less scarlet than her miracle, helplessly stretching out her hands to the tall

A boat full of tanned rowers separated from him; among them stood the one whom, as she

it seemed now, she knew, vaguely remembered from childhood. He looked at her with a smile

which warmed and hurried. But thousands of the last ridiculous fears overcame Assol;

mortally afraid of everything - mistakes, misunderstandings, mysterious and harmful interference, -

she ran up to her waist into the warm ripple of the waves, shouting: “I'm here, I'm here! It's me!"

Then Zimmer waved his bow - and the same melody burst through the nerves of the crowd, but on

this time in full, triumphant chorus. From excitement, movement of clouds and waves, shine

water and gave the girl almost could no longer distinguish what was moving: she, the ship or

boat, - everything moved, circled and fell.

But the oar splashed sharply near her; she raised her head. Gray bent down, her hands

grabbed his belt. Assol closed her eyes; then, quickly opening your eyes, boldly

smiled at his radiant face and breathlessly said:

Absolutely like that.

And you too, my child! - Taking out a wet jewel from the water, Gray said. -

Here I come. Did you recognize me?

She nodded, holding on to his belt, with a new soul and quivering closed eyes.

Happiness sat in her like a fluffy kitten. When Assol decided to open her eyes,

the rocking of the boat, the glitter of the waves, approaching, powerfully tossing and turning, the side of the "Secret" -

everything was a dream, where light and water swayed, swirling, like the play of sunbeams on

beaming wall. Without remembering how, she climbed up the ladder in Gray's strong arms.

The deck, covered and hung with carpets, in scarlet splashes of sails, was like a heavenly garden.

And soon Assol saw that she was standing in a cabin - in a room that could no longer be better.

Then from above, shaking and burying her heart in her triumphant cry, again rushed

great music. Again Assol closed her eyes, fearing that all this would disappear if she

watch. Gray took her hands, and knowing now where it was safe to go, she hid

a face wet with tears on the chest of a friend who came so magically. Carefully, but with a laugh,

himself shocked and surprised that an inexpressible, inaccessible to anyone

precious moment, Gray lifted up by the chin this long-long dreamed

face, and the girl's eyes finally opened clearly. They had all the best of a man.

Will you take my Longren to us? - she said.

Yes. - And he kissed her so hard after his iron "yes" that she

laughed.

(A. Green. "Scarlet Sails")

By the end of the school year, I asked my father to buy me a two-wheeled bicycle, a battery-powered submachine gun, a battery-powered airplane, a flying helicopter, and table hockey.

I so want to have these things! I said to my father. - They are constantly spinning in my head like a carousel, and from this my head is spinning so much that it is difficult to stay on my feet.

Hold on, - said the father, - do not fall and write all these things on a piece of paper for me so that I do not forget.

But why write, they already sit firmly in my head.

Write, - said the father, - it doesn't cost you anything.

In general, it costs nothing, - I said, - only an extra hassle. - And I wrote in large letters on the whole sheet:

WILISAPET

GUN-GUN

AIRCRAFT

VIRTALET

HACKEY

Then I thought about it and decided to write “ice cream” again, went to the window, looked at the sign opposite and added:

ICE CREAM

Father read and says:

I'll buy you ice cream for now, and wait for the rest.

I thought he had no time now, and I ask:

Until what time?

Until better times.

Until what?

Until next year ends.

Why?

Yes, because the letters in your head are spinning like a carousel, this makes you dizzy, and the words are not on their feet.

It's like words have legs!

And I've already bought ice cream a hundred times.

(Viktor Galyavkin "Carousel in the head")

Rose.

The last days of August... Autumn was already coming.
The sun was setting. A sudden gusty downpour, without thunder or lightning, has just swept over our wide plain.
The garden in front of the house burned and smoked, all flooded with the fire of the dawn and the deluge of rain.
She was sitting at the table in the drawing-room, and with stubborn thought she looked out into the garden through the half-open door.
I knew what was happening then in her soul; I knew that after a short, albeit painful, struggle, at that very moment she gave herself over to a feeling that she could no longer control.
Suddenly she got up, quickly went out into the garden and disappeared.
An hour has struck... another has struck; she did not return.
Then I got up and, leaving the house, went along the alley, along which - I had no doubt - she also went.
Everything went dark around; the night has already come. But on the damp sand of the path, brightly alley even through the poured darkness, a roundish object could be seen.
I leaned over... It was a young, slightly blossoming rose. Two hours ago I saw that same rose on her chest.
I carefully picked up the flower that had fallen into the dirt and, returning to the living room, put it on the table in front of her chair.
So she finally returned - and, with light steps, she walked the whole room, sat down at the table.
Her face grew pale and alive; quickly, with cheerful embarrassment, lowered eyes, like reduced ones, ran around.
She saw a rose, grabbed it, looked at its crumpled, soiled petals, looked at me, and her eyes, suddenly stopping, shone with tears.
- What are you crying about? I asked.
- Yes, about this rose. Look what happened to her.
This is where I thought I'd show my wisdom.
“Your tears will wash away this dirt,” I said with a significant expression.
“Tears don’t wash, tears burn,” she answered, and turning to the fireplace, she threw the flower into the dying flame.
“Fire will burn even better than tears,” she exclaimed, not without daring, “and cross-eyed eyes, still shining from tears, laughed boldly and happily.
I realized that she, too, had been burned. (I.S. Turgenev "ROSE")

I SEE YOU PEOPLE!

- Hello, Bezhana! Yes, it's me, Sosoya... I haven't been to you for a long time, my Bezhana! Excuse me!.. Now I’ll put everything in order here: I’ll clear the grass, straighten the cross, repaint the bench… Look, the rose has already faded… Yes, a lot of time has passed… And how much news I have for you, Bezhana! I don't know where to start! Wait a bit, I’ll tear out this weed and tell you everything in order ...

Well, my dear Bezhana: the war is over! Do not recognize now our village! The guys have returned from the front, Bezhana! The son of Gerasim returned, the son of Nina returned, Minin Yevgeny returned, and the father of Nodar Tadpole returned, and the father of Otiya. True, he is without one leg, but what does it matter? Just think, a leg! .. But our Kukuri, Lukayin Kukuri, did not return. Mashiko's son Malkhaz didn't come back either... Many didn't come back, Bezhana, and yet we have a holiday in the village! Salt, corn appeared ... Ten weddings were played after you, and at each I was among the guests of honor and drank great! Do you remember Georgy Tsertsvadze? Yes, yes, the father of eleven children! So, George also returned, and his wife Taliko gave birth to the twelfth boy, Shukria. That was fun, Bezhana! Taliko was in a tree picking plums when she went into labor! Do you hear Bejana? Almost resolved on a tree! I managed to get down! The child was named Shukria, but I call him Slivovich. It's great, isn't it, Bezhana? Slivovich! What is worse than Georgievich? In total, thirteen children were born to us after you ... And one more piece of news, Bezhana, - I know it will please you. Father took Khatia to Batumi. She will be operated on and she will see! Then? Then... You know, Bezhana, how much I love Khatia? So I'm marrying her! Of course! I'm doing a wedding, a big wedding! And we will have children!.. What? What if she doesn't wake up? Yes, my aunt also asks me about it... I'm getting married anyway, Bezhana! She can't live without me... And I can't live without Khatia... Didn't you love some kind of Minadora? So I love my Khatia ... And my aunt loves ... him ... Of course, she loves, otherwise she would not ask the postman every day if there is a letter for her ... She is waiting for him! You know who... But you also know that he will not return to her... And I am waiting for my Khatia. It makes no difference to me how she will return - sighted, blind. What if she doesn't like me? What do you think, Bejana? True, my aunt says that I have matured, prettier, that it’s hard to even recognize me, but ... what the hell is not joking! .. However, no, it’s impossible that Khatia doesn’t like me! After all, she knows what I am, she sees me, she herself spoke about this more than once ... I graduated from tenth grade, Bezhana! I'm thinking of going to college. I will become a doctor, and if Khatia is not helped in Batumi now, I will cure her myself. So, Bejana?

- Has our Sosoya completely lost his mind? Who are you talking to?

- Ah, hello, Uncle Gerasim!

- Hello! What are you doing here?

- So, I came to look at the grave of Bezhana ...

- Go to the office ... Vissarion and Khatia returned ... - Gerasim lightly patted my cheek.

I lost my breath.

- So how is it?!

- Run, run, son, meet ... - I did not let Gerasim finish, broke off, and rushed down the slope.

Faster, Sosoya, faster! Jump!.. Hurry, Sosoya!.. I'm running like I've never run in my life!.. My ears are ringing, my heart is ready to jump out of my chest, my knees are giving way... Don't you dare stop, Sosoya!.. Run! If you jump over this ditch, it means that Khatia is all right... You jumped! fifty without taking a breath - it means that everything is all right with Khatia ... One, two, three ... ten, eleven, twelve ... Forty-five, forty-six ... Oh, how difficult ...

- Hatia-ah-ah! ..

Out of breath, I ran up to them and stopped. I couldn't say another word.

- Soso! Khatia said quietly.

I looked at her. Khatia's face was as white as chalk. She looked with her huge, beautiful eyes somewhere in the distance, past me and smiled.

- Uncle Vissarion!

Vissarion stood with his head bowed and was silent.

- Well, uncle Vissarion? Vissarion did not answer.

- Hatia!

The doctors said that it was impossible to do the operation yet. They told me to definitely come next spring ... - Khatia said calmly.

My God, why didn't I count to fifty?! My throat tickled. I covered my face with my hands.

How are you, Sosoya? Do you have some new?

I hugged Khatia and kissed her on the cheek. Uncle Vissarion took out a handkerchief, wiped his dry eyes, coughed, and left.

How are you, Sosoya? Khatia repeated.

- Well ... Don't be afraid, Khatia ... Will they have an operation in the spring? I stroked Khatia's face.

She narrowed her eyes and became so beautiful, such that the Mother of God herself would envy her ...

- In the spring, Sosoya ...

“Don’t be afraid, Hatia!

“But I’m not afraid, Sosoya!”

“And if they can’t help you, I will, Khatia, I swear to you!”

“I know, Sosoya!

- Even if not ... So what? Do you see me?

“I see, Sosoya!

– What else do you need?

“Nothing else, Sosoya!”

Where are you going, dear, and where are you leading my village? Do you remember? One day in June, you took away everything that was dear to me in the world. I asked you, dear, and you returned everything you could return to me. I thank you dear! Now it's our turn. You will take us, me and Khatia, and lead you to where your end should be. But we don't want you to end. Hand in hand we will walk with you to infinity. You will never again have to deliver news about us in triangular letters and envelopes with printed addresses to our village. We'll be back, dear! We will face the east, we will see the golden sun rise, and then Khatia will say to the whole world:

- People, it's me, Khatia! I see you people!

(Nodar Dumbadze “I see you people!…”

Near a big city, an old, sick man was walking along a wide carriageway.

He staggered along; his emaciated legs, tangled, dragging and stumbling, stepped heavily and weakly, as if

strangers; his clothes hung in tatters; his uncovered head fell on his chest... He was exhausted.

He sat down on a roadside stone, leaned forward, leaned on his elbows, covered his face with both hands - and through twisted fingers tears dripped onto the dry, gray dust.

He remembered...

He recalled how he was once healthy and rich - and how he spent his health, and distributed wealth to others, friends and enemies ... And now he does not have a piece of bread - and everyone has left him, friends even before enemies ... Can he really stoop to the point of begging? And he was bitter at heart and ashamed.

And the tears kept dripping and dripping, mottling the gray dust.

Suddenly he heard someone calling his name; he lifted his weary head - and saw a stranger before him.

The face is calm and important, but not severe; eyes are not radiant, but light; eyes piercing, but not evil.

You gave away all your wealth, - an even voice was heard ... - But you don’t regret that you did good?

I don’t regret it,” the old man answered with a sigh, “only now I’m dying.

And there wouldn’t be beggars in the world who stretched out their hand to you,” continued the stranger, “you wouldn’t have anyone to show your virtue to, could you practice it?

The old man did not answer - and thought.

So don’t be proud now, poor fellow,” the stranger spoke again, “go, stretch out your hand, give other good people the opportunity to show in practice that they are good.

The old man started up, looked up... but the stranger had already disappeared; and in the distance a passer-by appeared on the road.

The old man came up to him and held out his hand. This passer-by turned away with a stern look and did not give anything.

But behind him was another - and he gave the old man a small alms.

And the old man bought himself a penny of bread for himself - and the begged-for piece seemed sweet to him - and there was no shame in his heart, but on the contrary: a quiet joy dawned on him.

(I.S. Turgenev "Alms")

Happy

Yes, I was happy once.
I have long defined what happiness is, a very long time ago - at the age of six. And when it came to me, I did not immediately recognize it. But I remembered what it should be, and then I realized that I was happy.
* * *
I remember: I am six years old, my sister is four.
We ran for a long time after dinner along the long hall, catching up with each other, squealing and falling. Now we are tired and quiet.
We stand side by side, look out the window at the muddy-spring twilight street.
Spring twilight is always disturbing and always sad.
And we are silent. We listen to how the lenses of the candelabra tremble from carts passing along the street.
If we were big, we would think about human malice, about insults, about our love that we offended, and about the love that we ourselves offended, and about happiness that does not exist.
But we are children and we don't know anything. We are just silent. We are afraid to turn around. It seems to us that the hall has already completely darkened and the whole big, noisy house in which we live has darkened. Why is he so quiet now? Maybe everyone left him and forgot us, little girls, huddled against the window in a dark huge room?
(* 61) Near my shoulder I see frightened, round eye sisters. She looks at me - should she cry or not?
And then I remember my impression of today, so bright, so beautiful that I immediately forget both the dark house and the dull, dreary street.
- Lena! - I say loudly and cheerfully. - Lena! I saw a horse today!
I cannot tell her everything about the immensely joyful impression that the horse-drawn tram made on me.
The horses were white and ran quickly, soon; the car itself was red or yellow, beautiful, there were a lot of people in it, all strangers, so that they could get to know each other and even play some kind of quiet game. And at the back, on the footboard, stood the conductor, all in gold - or maybe not all, but only a little, on buttons - and blew into a golden trumpet:
- Rram-rra-ra!
The sun itself rang in this chimney and flew out of it in golden-sounding sprays.
How do you say it all! One can only say:
- Lena! I saw a horse!
Yes, you don't need anything else. From my voice, from my face, she understood the boundless beauty of this vision.
And can anyone really jump into this chariot of joy and rush to the sound of the solar trumpet?
- Rram-rra-ra!
No, not everyone. Fraulein says you have to pay for it. That's why they don't take us there. We are locked in a boring, musty carriage with a rattling window, smelling of morocco and patchouli, and we are not even allowed to press our noses to the glass.
But when we are big and rich, we will only ride horseback riding. We will, we will, we will be happy!

(Taffy. "Happy")

Petrushevskaya Ludmila

Kitten of the Lord God

And the guardian angel rejoiced over the boys, standing behind his right shoulder, because everyone knows that the Lord himself equipped the kitten into the world, as he equips all of us, his children. And if the white light receives another creature sent by God, then this white light continues to live.

So, the boy grabbed the kitten in his arms and began to stroke it and carefully press it to him. And behind his left elbow was a demon, who was also very interested in the kitten and the mass of opportunities associated with this particular kitten.

The guardian angel got worried and began to draw magical pictures: here the cat is sleeping on the boy’s pillow, here he is playing with a piece of paper, here he is walking like a dog at his leg ... And the demon pushed the boy under the left elbow and suggested: it would be nice to tie a tin can on the kitten’s tail! It would be nice to throw him into the pond and watch, dying with laughter, how he will try to swim out! Those bulging eyes! And many other different proposals were made by the demon into the hot head of the expelled boy, while he was walking home with a kitten in his arms.

The guardian angel cried that theft would not lead to good, that thieves were despised all over the earth and put in cages like pigs, and that it was a shame for a person to take someone else's - but it was all in vain!

But the demon was already opening the gate of the garden with the words “he sees, but he will not come out” and laughed at the angel.

And the grandmother, lying in bed, suddenly noticed a kitten that climbed into her window, jumped onto the bed and turned on its motor, anointing itself in grandmother's frozen feet.

Grandmother was glad for him, her own cat was poisoned, apparently, with rat poison from neighbors in the garbage.

The kitten purred, rubbed its head against the grandmother's legs, received a piece of black bread from her, ate it and immediately fell asleep.

And we have already said that the kitten was not simple, but he was a kitten of the Lord God, and the magic happened at the same moment, they immediately knocked on the window, and the old woman’s son with his wife and child, hung with backpacks and bags, entered the hut: having received a letter from his mother, which arrived very late, he did not answer, no longer hoping for mail, but demanded a vacation, took his family and set off on a journey along the route bus - station - train - bus - bus - an hour on foot through two rivers, through the forest yes field, and finally arrived.

His wife, rolling up her sleeves, began to unpack bags of supplies, prepare dinner, he himself, taking a hammer, set off to repair the gate, their son kissed his grandmother on the nose, picked up a kitten and went into the raspberry garden, where he met a stranger boy, and here the guardian angel of the thief grabbed his head, and the demon retreated, chatting his tongue and smiling impudently, the unfortunate thief behaved in the same way.

The owner boy carefully put the kitten on an overturned bucket, and he himself gave the kidnapper a neck, and he rushed off. faster than the wind to the gate, which grandmother's son had just begun to repair, blocking the whole space with his back.

The demon sneered through the fence, the angel covered himself with his sleeve and cried, but the kitten passionately stood up for the child, and the angel helped to compose that the boy didn’t climb into raspberries, but after his kitten, who supposedly ran away. Or was it the devil who composed it, standing behind the wattle fence and chatting his tongue, the boy did not understand.

In short, the boy was released, but the adult did not give him a kitten, he ordered him to come with his parents.

As for the grandmother, her fate still left her to live: in the evening she got up to meet the cattle, and in the morning she cooked jam, worrying that they would eat everything and there would be nothing to give her son to the city, and at noon she sheared a sheep and a ram in order to have time to knit mittens for the whole family and socks.

Here our life is needed - here we live.

And the boy, left without a kitten and without raspberries, walked gloomy, but that evening he received a bowl of strawberries with milk from his grandmother for no reason, and his mother read him a fairy tale for the night, and the guardian angel was immensely glad and settled down in the sleeping man's head like all six year olds.

Kitten of the Lord God

One grandmother in the village fell ill, got bored and gathered for the next world.

Her son still did not come, did not answer the letter, so the grandmother prepared to die, let the cattle go into the herd, put a can pure water by the bed, put a piece of bread under the pillow, put the filthy bucket closer and lay down to read prayers, and the guardian angel stood up in her head.

And a boy with his mother came to this village.

Everything was not bad with them, their own grandmother functioned, kept a vegetable garden, goats and chickens, but this grandmother did not particularly welcome when her grandson tore berries and cucumbers in the garden: all this was ripe and ripe for stocks for the winter, for jam and pickles the same grandson, and if necessary, the grandmother herself will give.

This expelled grandson was walking around the village and noticed a kitten, small, big-headed and pot-bellied, gray and fluffy.

The kitten strayed to the child, began to rub against his sandals, casting sweet dreams on the boy: how it will be possible to feed the kitten, sleep with him, play.

And the guardian angel rejoiced over the boys, standing behind his right shoulder, because everyone knows that the Lord himself equipped the kitten into the world, as he equips all of us, his children.

And if the white light receives another creature sent by God, then this white light continues to live.

And every living creature is a test for those who have already settled: will they accept a new one or not.

So, the boy grabbed the kitten in his arms and began to stroke it and carefully press it to him.

And behind his left elbow was a demon, who was also very interested in the kitten and the mass of opportunities associated with this particular kitten.

The guardian angel became worried and began to draw magical pictures: here the cat is sleeping on the boy’s pillow, here he is playing with a piece of paper, here he is walking like a dog at his foot ...

And the devil pushed the boy under the left elbow and suggested: it would be nice to tie a tin can on the kitten's tail! It would be nice to throw him into the pond and watch, dying with laughter, how he will try to swim out! Those bulging eyes!

And many other different proposals were made by the demon into the hot head of the expelled boy, while he was walking home with a kitten in his arms.

And at home, the grandmother immediately scolded him, why did he carry the flea to the kitchen, his cat was sitting in the hut, and the boy objected that he would take him to the city with him, but then the mother entered into a conversation, and it was all over, the kitten was ordered carry away from where he took it and throw it over the fence.

The boy walked with the kitten and threw him over all the fences, and the kitten merrily jumped out to meet him after a few steps and again jumped and played with him.

So the boy reached the fence of that grandmother, who was about to die with a supply of water, and again the kitten was abandoned, but then he immediately disappeared.

And again the demon pushed the boy under the elbow and pointed him to someone else's good garden, where ripe raspberries and black currants hung, where gooseberries were golden.

The demon reminded the boy that the local grandmother was sick, the whole village knew about it, the grandmother was already bad, and the demon told the boy that no one would prevent him from eating raspberries and cucumbers.

The guardian angel began to persuade the boy not to do this, but the raspberries were so red in the rays of the setting sun!

The guardian angel cried that theft would not lead to good, that thieves were despised all over the earth and put in cages like pigs, and that it was a shame for a person to take someone else's - but it was all in vain!

Then the guardian angel finally began to instill fear in the boy that the grandmother would see from the window.

But the demon was already opening the gate of the garden with the words "he sees, but does not come out" and laughed at the angel.

The grandmother was fat, broad, with a soft, melodious voice. “I filled the whole apartment with myself! ..” Borka’s father grumbled. And his mother timidly objected to him: an old man... Where can she go? “Healed in the world ...” father sighed. “She belongs in an orphanage—that’s where!”

Everyone in the house, not excluding Borka, looked at the grandmother as if she were a completely superfluous person.

Grandma slept on a chest. All night she tossed heavily from side to side, and in the morning she got up before everyone else and rattled dishes in the kitchen. Then she woke up her son-in-law and daughter: “The samovar is ripe. Get up! Have a hot drink on the road ... "

She approached Borka: “Get up, my father, it’s time for school!” "Why?" Borka asked in a sleepy voice. "Why go to school? The dark man is deaf and dumb - that's why!

Borka hid his head under the covers: “Go on, grandma ...”

In the passage my father shuffled with a broom. “And where are you, mother, galoshes Delhi? Every time you poke into all the corners because of them!

Grandmother hurried to help him. “Yes, here they are, Petrusha, in plain sight. Yesterday they were very dirty, I washed them and put them on.

Borka would come from school, throw his coat and hat into his grandmother’s hands, throw a bag of books on the table and shout: “Grandma, eat!”

The grandmother hid her knitting, hurriedly set the table, and, crossing her arms over her stomach, watched Borka eat. During these hours, somehow involuntarily, Borka felt his grandmother as his close friend. He willingly told her about the lessons, comrades. Grandmother listened to him lovingly, with great attention, saying: “Everything is fine, Boryushka: both bad and good are good. From bad man it becomes stronger, from a good soul it blooms.

Having eaten, Borka pushed the plate away from him: “Delicious jelly today! Have you eaten, grandma? “Eat, eat,” the grandmother nodded her head. “Don’t worry about me, Boryushka, thank you, I’m well fed and healthy.”

A friend came to Borka. The comrade said: “Hello, grandmother!” Borka cheerfully nudged him with his elbow: “Let's go, let's go! You can't say hello to her. She's an old lady." The grandmother pulled up her jacket, straightened her scarf and quietly moved her lips: “To offend - what to hit, caress - you need to look for words.”

And in the next room, a friend said to Borka: “And they always say hello to our grandmother. Both their own and others. She's our boss." "How is it the main one?" Borka asked. “Well, the old one ... raised everyone. She cannot be offended. And what are you doing with yours? Look, father will warm up for this. "Do not warm up! Borka frowned. “He doesn’t greet her himself…”

After this conversation, Borka often for no reason asked his grandmother: “Do we offend you?” And he told his parents: “Our grandmother is the best, but she lives the worst of all - no one cares about her.” The mother was surprised, and the father was angry: “Who taught you to condemn your parents? Look at me - it's still small!

Grandmother, smiling softly, shook her head: “You fools should be happy. Your son is growing up for you! I have outlived mine in the world, and your old age is ahead. What you kill, you will not return.

* * *

Borka was generally interested in Babkin's face. There were various wrinkles on this face: deep, small, thin, like threads, and wide, dug out over the years. “Why are you so adorable? Very old?" he asked. Grandma thought. “By wrinkles, my dear, a human life, like a book, can be read. Grief and need have signed here. She buried children, cried - wrinkles lay on her face. I endured the need, fought - again wrinkles. My husband was killed in the war - there were many tears, many wrinkles remained. Big rain and that one digs holes in the ground.

He listened to Borka and looked in the mirror with fear: did he not enough cry in his life - is it possible that his whole face will drag on with such threads? "Go on, grandma! he grumbled. "You always talk nonsense..."

* * *

Per recent times the grandmother suddenly hunched over, her back became round, she walked more quietly and kept sitting down. “It grows into the ground,” my father joked. “Don’t laugh at the old man,” the mother was offended. And she said to her grandmother in the kitchen: “What is it, you, mother, are you moving around the room like a turtle? Send you for something and you won't get back."

Grandmother died before the May holiday. She died alone, sitting in an armchair with knitting in her hands: an unfinished sock lay on her knees, a ball of thread on the floor. Apparently, she was waiting for Borka. There was a ready-made device on the table.

The next day, the grandmother was buried.

Returning from the yard, Borka found his mother sitting in front of an open chest. All sorts of junk was piled on the floor. It smelled of stale things. The mother took out a crumpled red slipper and carefully straightened it with her fingers. “Mine too,” she said, and leaned low over the chest. - My..."

At the very bottom of the chest, a box rattled - the same cherished one that Borka always wanted to look into. The box was opened. Father took out a tight bundle: it contained warm mittens for Borka, socks for his son-in-law, and a sleeveless jacket for his daughter. They were followed by an embroidered shirt made of old faded silk - also for Borka. In the very corner lay a bag of candy tied with a red ribbon. Something was written on the bag in big block letters. The father turned it over in his hands, squinted and read aloud: “To my grandson Boryushka.”

Borka suddenly turned pale, snatched the package from him and ran out into the street. There, crouching at someone else's gate, he peered for a long time at grandmother's scribbles: "To my grandson Boryushka." There were four sticks in the letter "sh". "I didn't learn!" thought Borka. How many times did he explain to her that there were three sticks in the letter "w" ... And suddenly, as if alive, the grandmother stood in front of him - quiet, guilty, who had not learned her lesson. Borka looked around in confusion at his house and, clutching the bag in his hand, wandered down the street along the long fence of someone else ...

He came home late in the evening; his eyes were swollen with tears, fresh clay stuck to his knees. He put Babkin’s bag under his pillow and, covering himself with a blanket, thought: “Grandma won’t come in the morning!”

(V. Oseeva "Grandma")