Dmitry Merezhkovsky
November

A pale moon, on the wane,
The air sonorous, dead and clear,
And on the naked, nippy willow
Murmurs a wilted leaf.

Catches frost, gets heavier
In the abyss of a quiet pond.
Darkens and thickens
The stirless water.

A pale moon on the wane
Is lying dead,
And on the naked black willow
The cold ray doesn’t tremble.

The sky shimmers, dear,
As the magical earth,
As the inaccessible fields
Of a lost paradise.

Translated by Edmund Grinbaldt