Alexander Pushkin
- Verses Written During a Sleepless Night, by Babette Deutsch and Avrahm Yarmolinsky
(Sleep I cannot find, nor light...) - Verses, composed during a sleepless night, by Andrey Kneller
(I can’t sleep, the light is out...)
«We are cultured: we clean our teeth, / Mouth, and both boots. / In letters, we are especially polite: / “Your most obedient servant.” So then, why do we end / Any kind of debate — / like weak fools — / Imitating Papuans / And beating each other on the snouts? / True, it is u...»
«From the diary of a contemporary At wit’s end, I went to the doctor. / He pushed a pince-nez down on his nose: / “Nerves. Anxiety. Too soon to tell... / “So, I’ll prescribe / Guniyadi Janos.” The blood pounded in my temples: / Guniyadi?! For questions, / For disbelief, for bo...»
«Immortality? For you two-legged moles, / Who aren’t worthy of even a day on earth? / Perhaps — after feeling deeply offended — / Lizards, toads, and worms will want the same... Petty bourgeois with wings! Gingerbread and cakes! / They gorged themselves for half a century and now they ...»
«A simian profile / With slits for eyes; / Dumpling lips and a potato nose: / Neither a girl nor a goat. Hair like a fishtail; / No bust, more like a frying pan; / And growing from the chin — / It’s terrible, I know — a beard. Choppy gestures, long feet, / Hands twisted backward...»