I know the price of my poems.
I’m sorry for them, that’s all.
But the glory of the verse of others
I experience as betrayal.
Through digressions, repetitions,
Without colours and almost without words,
One single vision,
Like the moon through the clouds.
Now it shows, now it’s gone,
Now it fogs up slightly
And sheds quiet light
And brings inevitable reconciliation
With the tongue’s helplessness.
Стихам своим я знаю цену.
Мне жаль их, только и всего.
Но ощущаю как измену
Иных поэзий торжество.
Сквозь умаленья, повторенья,
Без красок и почти без слов,
Одно, единое виденье,
Как месяц из - за облаков,
То промелькнет, то исчезает,
То затуманится слегка, —
И тихим светом озаряет,
И непреложно примиряет
С беспомощностью языка.
«They don't wait for letters, / For a letter they wait. / A shred of rag / Around a braid / Of glue. Within — a word. / And happiness. And this - is all. Thus they don't wait for joy, / Thus they wait for the end: / A soldier's salute / And into the chest — lead / Three pieces...»
«I opened my veins. Unstoppably / life spurts out with no remedy. / Now I set out bowls and plates. / Every bowl will be shallow. / Every plate will be small. / And overflowing their rims, / into the black earth, to nourish / the rushes unstoppably / without...»
«I’ve cut open my veins: irrevocably, / Irreplaceably gushes life. / Bring forth dishes and bowls! / Any bowl will prove too small / Any dish — too shallow. / Filling up and overly / Feeding reeds, through the earth rushing. / Inconceivably, irrevocably, / Irreplaceably, verse is ...»
«I died. The sycamores gave shade; / shutters were shut upon the dust / of the hot streets steamily teased / by the torrid Aeolus. / / I slowly walked, and the fauns walked; / It seemed as though I recognised / the great god Pan in every faun. / Good. I must be in Paradise. / / ...»