Anna Akhmatova
Three times...

Three times she returned to torment me;
the third time I woke, in pain, with a cry.
I saw her slender hands, almost recognized
those red lips, that malicious smile.

She said, “Who were you kissing
just before sunrise, swearing
that this farewell would kill you too?
No less than the darkness down there by the gate,
your sobs concealed your joy
at having such spice-hot, delicious power.
You know, yes, you do, that man you led on
to his doom—he really will die.”

The voice was as thrillingly shrill as a hawk’s,
and weirdly like that of someone I knew.
I doubled over, shivered at feeling
the wind from the wing of death.
I drew around me, for protection, the bedclothes;
they felt like the heavy netting
of a spider’s inevitable web.

I knew this apparition:
my own form, repeating my words,
my—now unforgivable—lies.

Translated by Seraphina Powell