to Valentina Serova
In a dream, I saw a wedding
And I think the bride was you.
You the bride and I a beggar
At the porch — it may be true!
Let it happen as I dreamed it!
Only promise, as you stand
At the porch, to have the kindness —
Put no alms into my hand!
До утра перед разлукой
Свадьба снилась мне твоя.
Паперть. Сон, должно быть, в руку:
Ты — невеста. Нищий — я.
Пусть случится всё, как снилось,
Только в жизни обещай —
Выходя, мне, сделай милость,
Милостыни не давай.
«Good poetry just tantalizes me, / Bad poems are so sweet for some reason: / They don't hurt me,don't sting my soul like bee, / Indeed,they have warmth of the "velvet" season. / They are like such sweet lemonade for me / Or a light silk dressing-gown,let even artsy. / For genius I have a ...»
«In wide-brimmed hats and long duffel coats, / With notebooks full of your verse, / Long ago like fallen lilac sprigs, / Into dust you've since dispersed. You're in that land, where no shape's ready-made, / Where everything's disjointed, blurred, aborted, / Where the sky is replaced by a b...»
«Months of languor have settled in / Can it be that life is over, / Or, its work done, has come / Like a late guest to the table... It wants to drink, but won't touch wine, / And wants to eat, but has no appetite. / It listens to the whisper of an ash / And to a goldfinch singing outside...»
«In this world where our / Role is obscure and frail, / You and I will both grow old / Like the king in a fairy tale. Our life, shining patiently, / Burns out in a forbidden land, / And silently we meet there / Fate's inevitable hand. And when those silver streaks / Begin to glitter i...»