I thought I already knew about insomnia,
All its abysses and trails,
But this is like clattering horses
Under a trumpet’s wild shriek.
I step foot into empty houses,
Into someone else’s domestic life.
All is still except for the white shades
Afloat in foreign mirrors.
And where is that in the mist — Denmark,
Normandy, or somewhere
I myself once was,
And what is this — a new edition
Of moments long since forgotten?
Уж я ль не знала бессонницы
Все пропасти и тропы,
Но эта как топот конницы
Под вой одичалой трубы.
Вхожу в дома опустелые,
В недавний чей-то уют.
Всё тихо, лишь тени белые
В чужих зеркалах плывут.
И что там в тумане — Дания,
Нормандия или тут
Сама я бывала ранее,
И это — переиздание
Навек забытых минут?
«Night, streets, the lantern, the drugstore, / The meaningless and dusky light. / A quarter of the century more — / All fall the same into your sight! You died — as it was before — / You have the former way to start: / The streets, the lantern, the drugstore, / Swell of the canal ...»
«The river stretched. It flows, idly grieves, / And washes both banks. / In steppe, above light clay of cliffs / Rinks mourn in ranks. O Russia! Dear wife! With clearness and pain / We see the lengthy way! / It sent an arrow of ancient Tartar reign — / In breast it lay. The way throug...»
«Your sweetheart forever leaving, / Friend, you swear me to love!.. / And in lands of boring living / To preserve the pledge above!.. Outside our Denmark, happy, / Your dark shores lay in grief... / And the tide, enraged and gabby, / Washes tears on a reef... Dressed not in the silk ...»
«Don't call. Without any summons / I'll reach the shrine. / And droop my head in even silence / To your feet fine. I will your orders shyly listen / And will remain / To catch our meetings, short and instant, / And wish again. I fell before your passions' power, / Before its wave, / ...»