The lazy artist-boor is blacking
The genius's picture with his stuff,
Without any sense a-making
His low drawing above.
But alien paints, in stride of years,
Are falling down as a dust,
The genius's masterpiece appears
With former brilliance to us.
Like this, the darkly apparitions
Are leaving off my tortured heart,
And it again revives the visions
Of virgin days I left behind.
Художник-варвар кистью сонной
Картину гения чернит
И свой рисунок беззаконный
Над ней бессмысленно чертит.
Но краски чуждые, с летами,
Спадают ветхой чешуёй;
Созданье гения пред нами
Выходит с прежней красотой.
Так исчезают заблужденья
С измученной души моей,
И возникают в ней виденья
Первоначальных, чистых дней.
«1 I break the layered rocks / In the hour when the silty day / Is moulded, and my tired mule carries / The weighty lumps on its shaggy back. We carry them to the railroad, / Put them in a heap, — and to the sea again / The hairy legs lead us, / And the mule starts braying. And it br...»
«The city took off its wintery things. / The snows turned slobbery. / Spring has come again, / foolish and loose-tongued / as an army cadet.»
«The hooves clattered. / As if singing: / — Crib. / Grab. / Grub. / Gruff. Drunk with the wind, / ice-shod, / the street slid away, / a horse landed / with a wallop on its crupper, / and instantly, / gaper after gaper, / boot-cut pants on Kuznetskii, / ganged up / with ...»
«I have a mom on the cornflower-blue wallpaper. / I stroll in mottled slacks, / and torment the whirly daises with measured steps. / An evening begins to frolic on rusty oboes, / I come to the small window, / believing, / that I shall again see / the cloud / seated on top of the house...»