I thought of eagles for a long time
and understood such a whole lot:
the eagles soar above the clouds,
they fly and fly and touch no one.
They live on cliffs and on mountains
and are intimate with water sprites,
I thought a long time about eagles
but confused them, I think, with flies.
Я долго думал об орлах
и понял многое:
орлы летают в облаках,
летают никого не трогая.
Я понял, что живут орлы на скалах и в горах
и дружат с водяными духами.
Я долго думал об орлах,
но спутал, кажется, их с мухами.
«She stands there with a sly expression, smiling. / Holding a huge scroll in her marble hands. / She notes life, death, and fame in her compiling, / Records all time, all people in all lands. And she (who’s not to blame) gets bored and weary / With fates of slaves, chiefs, races, patriarch...»
«Wedding wreaths crown the mountains. / I’m ecstatic... I’m young. / And all over my mountains / Such a pure chill is hung. And behold — to my rock / Came a gray-haired hunchback, shuffling-stumbling. / And the gift that he brought / Was pineapples from an underground dungeon. O h...»
«Once there lived both he and I; / To be friends we had to die. Skeleton, he'd visit me... / Winters, summers... frequently. Simple heart and solid bone; / We strolled this graveyard alone. And with laughter he’d recall / That gay day: our funeral. How they bore box behind box... / Ho...»
«He believed in a golden radiance, / And he died from the arrows of the sun. / He measured centuries with his thinking, / But could not live his life — this one. Don’t laugh at the dead poet: / But come, bring him a wreath. / On the cross — winter, summer / There bangs my porcelai...»