Anna Akhmatova
Shade

What does a woman alone know about mortal time?
O. Mandelstam

Ever the best dressed of all, of all the rosiest and tallest,
Why do you rise up from the depth of murderous years?
And why does memory wave at me ravishingly
With your transparent profile from a carriage window?
How we would bicker — were you angel or bird?
The poet dubbed you “the straw
Through the dark lashes and Daryal2 eyes
A beneficent light fell equally upon all.
O shade! Forgive me, but the clear weather,
Flaubert, insomnia and belated lilacs
Remind me of you — beauty of the thirteenth year —
Of you — and of your cloudless and
Unsettled day... Memory of such a face
Does not suit my genius now. O Shade!

Translated by Don Mager