Striking clock welcomes autumn to town:
This year notably heavy and hard,
Fallen fruit hits the ground, and the count
Is the number of fruit in the yard.
With this music, important and clear,
Who repeats that the clock must still go?
The old garden performs with no fear
Looking strangely indifferent though.
Nature’s downcast mood looking tender,
Love and kinship get easy to see.
As if you were no random bystander,
But the culprit of its jubilee.
Бьют часы, возвестившие осень:
тяжелее, чем в прошлом году,
ударяется яблоко оземь —
столько раз, сколько яблок в саду.
Этой музыкой, внятной и важной,
кто твердит, что часы не стоят?
Совершает поступок отважный,
но как будто бездействует сад.
Всё заметней в природе печальной
выраженье любви и родства,
словно ты — не свидетель случайный,
а виновник ее торжества.
«The boy said me: “how painful it is!” / And I feel guilty somehow. / Not long ago, he was living in bliss / And knew no sadness till now. But at this moment he surely knows sorrow / No less than the wise and the old. / It seems that his eyes have begun to grow narrow, / And their on...»
«The Polish church’s lofty vaults / Are bluer than the skies… / O, merry boy, it’s all my fault, / I’ve brought you your demise. — For all the roses from the garden, / For all you’ve written of, / For you, so dark and ardent, / Turned dull and pale from love. I thought: it...»
«To M. Lozinsky This heavy, amber day — it wouldn’t end! / Grief is impossible, and waiting won’t suffice! / The deer speaks with a silver voice again / In the menagerie about the northern lights. I, too, believed that there exists cool snow, / A blue font for the needy and unwell, / ...»
«To O. A. Glebova-Sudeikina As you stare at the wall, what is catching your eye, / In the hour, when sunset still hangs in the sky? A gull on the blue tablecloth of the sea, / Or is it Florentine gardens, is that what you see? Perhaps the Tsar’s Village, with its enormous old park, / Where...»