Georgy Ivanov
With this inhuman fate

With this inhuman fate
How can one argue? How can one fight?
This is mirage, illusion.
Still this blue evening yet
Is my domain, possession.

And the sky is red between the trees
While it is pearly on the sides…
In lilacs the nightingale still whistles.
The ant crawls in grass between the thistles –
And someone needs it otherwise.

Someone might even think it’s fair
That I can still breathe in this air
That my old-fashioned coat
Is soaked in sunset on the right
And drowned in stars on the left side.

Translated by Ian Probstein