It drizzled, but not even grasses
Would bend within the bag of storm;
Dust only gulped its rain in pellets,
The iron roof — in powder form.
The village did not hope for healing.
Deep as a swoon the poppies yearned
Among the rye in inflammation,
And God in fever tossed and turned.
In all the sleepless, universal,
The damp and orphaned latitude,
The signs and moans, their posts deserting,
Fled with the whirlwind in pursuit.
Behind them ran blind slanting raindrops
Hard on their heels, and by the fence
The wind and dripping branches argued —
My heart stood still — at my expense.
I felt this dreadful garden chatter
Would last forever, since the street
Would also notice me, and mutter
With bushes, rain and window shutter.
No way to challenge my defeat —
They’d argue, talk me off my feet.
Накрапывало, — но не гнулись
И травы в грозовом мешке,
Лишь пыль глотала дождь в пилюлях,
Железо в тихом порошке.
Селенье не ждало целенья,
Был мак, как обморок, глубок,
И рожь горела в воспаленье,
И в лихорадке бредил бог.
В осиротелой и бессонной,
Сырой, всемирной широте
С постов спасались бегством стоны,
Но вихрь, зарывшись, коротел.
За ними в бегстве слепли следом
Косые капли. У плетня
Меж мокрых веток с ветром бледным
Шел спор. Я замер. Про меня!
Я чувствовал, он будет вечен,
Ужасный, говорящий сад.
Еще я с улицы за речью
Кустов и ставней — не замечен,
Заметят — некуда назад:
Навек, навек заговорят.
«To Z. N. Gippius Enough’s enough: don’t wait, don’t hope; / My wretched people scatter! / Fall into space and shatter, / Year upon tormented year. Beggarly, will-less age. / Permit me, oh my motherland. / To sob in your damp fatuous freedom / To weep amid your empty steppes: — ...»
«He loved these three things / White peacocks, evening songs, / And worn-out maps of America. / No crying of children, / No raspberry tea, / No women's hysterics… / I was married to him.»
«I wrung my hands under my dark veil… / "Why are you pale, what makes you reckless?" / — Because I have made my loved one drunk / with an astringent sadness. I’ll never forget. He went out, reeling; / his mouth was twisted, desolate . . . / I ran downstairs, not touching the banister...»
«Dark my veil. Hands clenched painfully, tightly. / "Why so white-faced?" "To think, just to think! / It was I made him to drink; of the biting / Wine of sorrow I forced him to drink. "How forget? Out he staggered with failing / Strength, and face oddly twisted and grim. / I ran down ...»