The more the autumn wind is wicked
And the moon desperate, —
The merrier we, vagrants, get
With a bottle of wine.
We wandered the whole day through
The field, with a sleuth and a rifle…
We are comrades — nothing more —
Unacknowledging sorrow.
What is love? Rapture, lips,
The fervour of understatement…!
Moderately gentle, moderately rough,
You know how to be with me.
You smoke a Finnish pipe
And follow the wisp…
Narrowing your mocking eye,
Turning on your stomach!..
What is love? A smouldering match, —
Better things can be found:
Between desire and habit
There are paths of bliss.
Чем осенний ветер злее
И отчаянней луна, —
Нам, бродягам, веселее
За бутылкою вина.
Целый день блуждали в поле
Мы с собакой и ружьем...
Мы товарищи — не боле —
Но тоски не признаем.
Что любовь? Восторги, губы,
Недосказанности зной... !
В меру нежным, в меру грубым
Ты умеешь быть со мной.
Трубку финскую ты куришь
И следишь, как дым плывет...
Глаз насмешливый прищуришь,
Повернувшись на живот!..
Что любовь? дотлеет спичкой, —
Можно лучшее найти:
Между страстью и привычкой
Есть блаженные пути.
«I have not heard the tales of Ossian, / I have not tasted age-old wine — / why then do I seem to see a field / and Scotland's murderous moon? And in the sinister silence I seem to hear / the roll-call of the raven and the harp, / and, streaming in the wind, the scarves of men-at-arms / ...»
«For joy’s sake, from my hands, / take some honey and some sun, / as Persephone’s bees told us. Not to be freed, the unmoored boat. / Not to be heard, fur-booted shadows. / Not to be silenced, life’s dark terrors. Now we only have kisses, / dry and bristling like bees, / that die ...»
«Take — for the sake of joy — out of my palms / a little sunlight and a little honey, / as we were told to by Persephone’s bees. You can’t untie a boat that isn’t moored, / nor can you hear a shadow shod in fur, / nor — in this dense life — overpower fear. The only thing that...»
«The flowers say good-bye to me, / They bend their heads and bow low down / Which means that I will never see / Her lovely face and my home town. / / Well, that"s the way it is, my love! / I saw them all in habitation, / I take this deathly trepidation / For tender feeling, still a...»