I knew her as far back
as those unbelievable years.
Tutchev
With years you haven't changed, my fair:
You're charming, strict, as clear as day;
The only change is in your hair,
It"s sleek and with a flash of grey.
Well, as for me, I'm sitting here,
Over my books, back at my place,
With an inscrutable idea
I'm looking at your quiet face.
The years, they haven't changed us, really,
We live the way we did before,
Fantastic years, we love them dearly
And will remember evermore...
Their spirit is in azure darkness,
Their ashes in the urn of dust.
It's more and more relaxed and lustrous
To breathe remembering the past.
Я знал её ещё тогда,
В те баснословные года.
Тютчев
Прошли года, но ты – всё та же:
Строга, прекрасна и ясна;
Лишь волосы немного глаже,
И в них сверкает седина.
А я – склонён над грудой книжной,
Высокий, сгорбленный старик, –
С одною думой непостижной
Смотрю на твой спокойный лик.
Да. Нас года не изменили.
Живём и дышим, как тогда,
И, вспоминая, сохранили
Те баснословные года…
Их светлый пепел – в длинной урне.
Наш светлый дух – в лазурной мгле.
И всё чудесней, всё лазурней –
Дышать прошедшим на земле.
«Careful, puss, there’s an owl / embroidered on the chair. / Grey puss, don’t growl — / or Grandpa will hear. / The candle’s gone out; / there are mice on the stair. / I’m afraid of the owl. / Nanny, who put it there?»
«Everything’s changed, nothing has changed / in the strange chill, strange chill of dawn. / I’ve dreamed many dreams over the years / and now I awake – with the years all gone. Here we go, here I stand in an autumn field / (changed, unchanged, I don’t understand) — / as if I’ve...»
«O Muse of Weeping... / — M. Tsvetaeva I have turned aside from everything, / From the whole earthly store. / The spirit and guardian of this place / is an old tree-stump in water. We are brief guests of the earth, as it were, / And life is a habit we put on. / On paths of air I seem ...»
«It’s good that Russia has no Tsar, / it’s good that Russia’s just a dream, / it’s good that God has disappeared, that nothing’s real, except the stars / in icy skies, the yellow gleam / of dawn, the unrelenting years. It’s good that people don’t exist, / that nothingness is...»