There were many old women and only a few old men...
Perhaps it was life, just life, or perhaps something else again
But it bent the old women, and the old men it broke:
Some died of heart-attacks, others of strokes.
The old women went through their closets and chests,
And laid out their spouses decked in their Sunday best.
The coffins they bought were of oak, and rather expensive,
The hands of the dead looked uncannily massive...
In time, whole housefuls of flats filled slowly with shadows:
Whole block fuls appeared, whole streetfuls of widows,
Who were fearful of thieves and also of burglars,
Passed yellowish beads between yellowing fingers,
And chatted of death as of a neighbour, or friend
With whom they took tea, and on whom they had learnt to depend
A neighbour or friend as gaunt as poor Anna Petrovna
Of long-faced and sad-eyed as Maria Andrevna.
They rose with the dawn, like sailors at sea,
And for hours on end, being hopelessly free,
Sat in baggy old smocks and shapeless old dresses
Listlessly combing their sparse, thinning tresses.
To bed they went early, like army recruits,
But sleep would not come, and they lay there, mute,
In their dusty and darkish chambers.
And thought about things that were good to remember.
Their lives rose before them, the toll of love and of duty,
Their long lives of toil, and brief moments of beauty...
The night tram clanged by,
In the sky
The night stars erupted...
Insomnia's vigil
Was uninterrupted.
Вл. Сякину
Старух было много, стариков было мало:
то, что гнуло старух, стариков ломало.
Старики умирали, хватаясь за сердце,
а старухи, рванув гардеробные дверцы,
доставали костюм выходной, суконный,
покупали гроб дорогой, дубовый
и глядели в последний, как лежит законный,
прижимая лацкан рукой пудовой.
Постепенно образовались квартиры,
а потом из них слепились кварталы,
где одни старухи молитвы твердили,
боялись воров, о смерти болтали.
Они болтали о смерти, словно
она с ними чай пила ежедневно,
такая же тощая, как Анна Петровна,
такая же грустная, как Марья Андревна.
Вставали рано, словно матросы,
и долго, темные, словно индусы,
чесали гребнем редкие косы,
катали в пальцах старые бусы.
Ложились рано, словно солдаты,
а спать не спали долго-долго,
катая в мыслях какие-то даты,
какие-то вехи любви и долга.
И вся их длинная,
вся горевая,
вся их радостная,
вся трудовая —
вставала в звонах ночного трамвая,
на миг
бессонницы не прерывая.
«Land of mine, where I was bred, / Horses wildly flying, / Eagles screeching overhead. / On the fields wolves crying! Hail, dear land of my delight, / Pinewoods thickly growing, / Nightingales that sing at sight, / Steppe and cloud and blowing! »
«It was an early day of spring, / The grass was scarcely showing. / Brooks ran, no heat was hovering. / And green the wood was glowing. The shepherd to the morning breeze / Was not yet piping highly. / And still in curls among the trees / The fern was peeping shyly. It was an early day ...»
«Believe me not, friend, when in grief’s unreason / I tell you that I love you now no more. / When the tide ebbs, believe not the sea’s treason; / It will come back, in loving, to the shore. I love you still, with my old passion glowing; / My freedom I shall give to you again. / Alread...»
«Where boughs above the pool are swinging. / Where the hot summer sunshine burns, / The dragon-flies in airy winging / Lead on the dance’s merry turns. “Come hither, child, come nigh and hear us; / For we shall teach you how to fly! / Come hither, child, come hither, near us, / And l...»