«Nothing, nothing will be returned; / love, forgiveness — unearned, unlearned; / though we can never learn to forget. Sweet is the sleep of an alien land. / We sense spring, hear the sea’s even sound / in this world of eternal torment.»
«Nothing’s been taken away! / We’re apart — I’m delighted by this! / Across the hundreds of miles / that divide us, I send you my kiss. Our gifts, I know, are unequal. / For the first time my voice is still. / What, my young Derzhavin, do / you make of my doggrel? For your terri...»
«I dearly, dearly long to be with you, / to sit and chat with you, drink tea with you. You’d do the talking — I would be all ears; / your voice grows ever dearer with the years. You, too, knew grief and fury and disdain; / you, too, died slowly, slowly and in pain.»
«The smokey blotches of the neighbours’ windows, / and windswept roses bending, drawing breath — / if I could think that life is but a dream, / that we cannot help waking after death. To wait in heaven — heaven is so blue — / to wait in that cool bliss without a care. / And then, ...»