Do not speak of the north and its sadness
And a dread and malevolent fate.
Surely this is a festive occasion:
You and I, we are parting today.
Never mind that the moon will not haunt us,
And the dawn you and I will not meet.
I will shower you with gifts, my beloved,
Of a kind that have never been seen.
Take my wavering, dancing reflection
In the shimmery glass of a stream;
Take my gaze that the great, swooning stars
As they fall from the heavens arrests;
Take my voice, take its spent, broken echo,
Once so summery, youthful and fresh....
Take my gifts: they will help you to listen
Without pain to the gossiping birds
In the wet of a Moscow October,
And will turn autumn's gloom to the languor
And the sweetness of May.... O, my angel,
Think of me, think of me till the first
Flakes of snow start to waltz in the air....
Не стращай меня грозной судьбой
И великою северной скукой.
Нынче праздник наш первый с тобой,
И зовут этот праздник — разлукой.
Ничего, что не встретим зарю,
Что луна не блуждала над нами,
Я сегодня тебя одарю
Небывалыми в мире дарами:
Отраженьем моим на воде
В час, как речке вечерней не спится.
Взглядом тем, что падучей звезде
Не помог в небеса возвратиться,
Эхом голоса, что изнемог,
А тогда был и свежий, и летний, —
Чтоб ты слышать без трепета мог
Воронья подмосковного сплетни,
Чтобы сырость октябрьского дня
Стала слаще, чем майская нега...
Вспоминай же, мой ангел, меня,
Вспоминай хоть до первого снега.
«(From the Sonnet-cycle "Lunaria") Pure pearl of silence brooding on the sky, / Presider o'er conception, lamp of dreams, / Altar of nightly spells, of crystal gleams, / Queen of the waters where thou lov'st to lie, With what desire, where the long waves sigh, / Through my dark crucifixions...»
«Whose the flying hands, about me shedding / Fire, and leading me on passionate ways? / No sonorous stones my feet are treading, / But where vatic waters fill the days. / Piercing through the spirit, sharp pilasters / Rise, and candle sting the dark like bees. / Oh, the hearts that bloom ...»
«Now dry thy eyes, and shed no tears. / In heaven's straw-pale meadows veers / Aquarius, and earthward peers, / His emptied vessel overturning. No storming snows, no clouds that creep / Across the sheer pure emerald steep, / Whence, thinly-drawn, a ray darts deep / As a keen lance with e...»
«Night was done. We rose and after / Washing, dressing, — kissed with laughter, — / After all the sweet night knows. / Lilac breakfast cups were clinking / While we sat like brothers drinking / Tea, — and kept our dominoes. And our dominoes smiled greeting, / And our eyes avoided m...»