Here is the long-bided hour: the labor of years is accomplished.
Why should this sadness unplumbed secretly weigh on my heart?
Is it, my work being done, I stand like a laborer, useless,
One who has taken his pay, alien to unwonted tasks?
Is it the work I regret, the silent companion of midnight,
Friend of the golden-haired Dawn, friend of the gods of the hearth?
Миг вожделенный настал: окончен мой труд многолетний.
Что ж непонятная грусть тайно тревожит меня?
Или, свой подвиг свершив, я стою, как подёнщик ненужный,
Плату приявший свою, чуждый работе другой?
Или жаль мне труда, молчаливого спутника ночи,
Друга Авроры златой, друга пенатов святых?
«In that magic forest, towering trees / Unexpectedly come forward from the haze. Out of the earth, roots spring from other roots, / Like the arms of the dwellers of burial vaults. Under the cover of the blazing autumn leaves / Lonesome giants, trolls, and lions used to live. Here sailors ...»
«White trunks / were stark, suddenly, against the haze, Roots wound up out of the ground / like corpses’ arms. The leaves’ bright fire / hid giants, dwarves, lions; Fishermen saw in the sand / the print of a six-fingered hand. No French noble, no knight of the Round Table, / ever wa...»
«In brambles, deep in huge marshes, / near a tin river, / in shaggy log cabins, dark, dark, / there are strange muzhiks.* Sometimes one comes out, there where no roads go / where feather-grass* scatters, / and he listens to Stribog* scream, and / he senses an old story, a true story. A ...»
«Valentine to the tavern students boasts / Of his sister’s charms and face, / While on Margarita’s left hand / A costly ring is placed. At Margarita’s, a casket lies / With rings for fingers and ears. / While in ivy, hid beneath her window, / The red caped trickster sneers. At Gre...»