Envy not your friend if hes more handsome,
More intelligent or wealthier than you.
Let his merits and let his successes
Not tear up the laces on your shoe.
Move along your way without a care,
Smile still broader out of his success!
Maybe hell face darkness and despair
And your porch will be adorned with bliss!
Laugh with him, and cry with his distresses:
Feel him with your heart, and for all time!
Do not block your friend from his successes:
Its a sin to do so! Truly, its a crime!
Не завидуй другу, если друг богаче,
Если он красивей, если он умней.
Пусть его достатки, пусть его удачи
У твоих сандалий не сотрут ремней…
Двигайся бодрее по своей дороге,
Улыбайся шире от его удач:
Может быть, блаженство — на твоём пороге,
А его, быть может, ждут нужда и плач.
Плачь его слезою! смейся шумным смехом!
Чувствуй полным сердцем вдоль и поперёк!
Не препятствуй другу ликовать успехом:
Это — преступленье! Это — сверхпорок!
«I am riveted to the tavern counter. / Long past drunk, I don't give a damn. / A sleigh has stolen my happiness / Away into the silvery smoke... It flew off in a sleigh, is buried deep / In the snows of time, in the reaches of years... / And it only sifts over my soul, / Like a silvery m...»
«My fingers slipped out of your hands. / You’re walking away with a frown. / Look how the birch trees have strewn / red leaves with the rain of their blood. Pale autumn, cold autumn has spread / itself over us, reaching up high. / A barren plain stretching around us / breathes a cloud ...»
«To Z. N. Gippius Enough’s enough: don’t wait, don’t hope; / My wretched people scatter! / Fall into space and shatter, / Year upon tormented year. Beggarly, will-less age. / Permit me, oh my motherland. / To sob in your damp fatuous freedom / To weep amid your empty steppes: — ...»
«He loved these three things / White peacocks, evening songs, / And worn-out maps of America. / No crying of children, / No raspberry tea, / No women's hysterics… / I was married to him.»