In the state there is the law
Citizens cannot ignore.
In the anti-state the sheep
Have a private rule they keep.
Under rule of law the folk
Serve what gives them food and drink
But rebellion has no book
And revolt no pen and ink.
When rebellion goes to press
When revolt takes up a pen
It has donned official dress
Nourishes the sons of men
Codifies its rights and wrongs
Rids the aged of their qualms.
Revolutionary songs
Are replaced by hymns and psalms.
У государства есть закон,
Который гражданам знаком.
У антигосударства —
Не знает правил паства.
Держава, подданных держа,
Диктует им порядки.
Но нет чернил у мятежа,
У бунта нет тетрадки.
Когда берет бумагу бунт,
Когда перо хватает,
Уже одет он и обут
И юношей питает,
Отраду старцам подает,
Уже чеканит гривны,
Бунтарских песен не поет,
Предпочитает гимны.
Остыв, как старая звезда,
Он вышел на орбиту
Во имя быта и труда
И в честь труда и быта.
«Years of youth are quickly passing / Days of happiness elapse. / What the providence intended / Will inevitably happen: / Either solely the pitiful / But plentiful and dutiful / Be on your shoulder tapping, / Or something very beautiful / And fanciful will suddenly / Collapse onto ...»
«My ear is shocked by every noise, / My eye — by light of sun or fire, / My spirit launched its cutting growth, / Like a tooth — through gums which swelled entire. It will break through and leave at once, / The former covering it sphere, / And with his thousands bright eyes, / Will...»
«The hum of spring will not else loosen / My verses of the clenched words, / I’ve loved steel grating and diffusion, / Of sunk in cacophony worlds. In the gaping of wide-open vowels / My breath is easy, fresh and free. / In throngs of consonants it grows — / The noise of piled-up ice...»
«Lady’s hands were washed and serviced, / Lady’s hands were strongly stirred, / This good Lady didn’t forget, else, / A red neck that was cut here. Poor Lady, with her fears, / Shakes in her bed like a birdie. / She didn’t sleep for hundred years — / I didn’t — for six y»