Chénier went up to meet the guillotine,
And I'm alive. That is a dreadful sin.
There are times that steel over everyone.
He is no bard who sings as bullets spin.
He is no father, trembling at the gate,
Whose arms rip battle-armor off his son.
There are times when the sun is deadly sin.
It is no human who today lives on.
Андрей Шенье взошёл на эшафот,
А я живу — и это страшный грех.
Есть времена — железные — для всех.
И не певец, кто в порохе — поёт.
И не отец, кто с сына у ворот
Дрожа срывает воинский доспех.
Есть времена, где солнце — смертный грех.
Не человек — кто в наши дни живёт.
«Outside, the blizzard sets in deep / And all its polish coats. / The paper seller is asleep, / Her kiosk, drifting, floats. Not once we’ve happened to observe / In our lives’ lengthy course, / The snowfall comes with shy reserve / To trick our eyes perforce. Concealing unrepentantl...»
«Snow is falling, falling down. / The geraniums are trying / To befriend the sparkles flying / Past the window’s woven bound. Snow is falling, all’s in action, / Smitten, taking off the ground: / The black stairs, the intersection, — / All is being lost and found. Snow is falling...»
«Snowing on, snowing on. / On a windowsill, the flower / Of geranium's reaching out for / Starlets of the snow beyond. Snowing on and all’s in chaos, / All's engaged into a twirl: / Wooden footsteps of back stairs / And a snowbound crossroad turn. Snowing on, snowing on. / Like inst...»
«Beneath the willow wound round with ivy / we take cover from the worst / of the storm, with a greatcoat round / our shoulders and my hands around your waist. I’ve got it wrong. That isn’t ivy / entwined in the bushes round / the wood, but hops. You intoxicate me! / Let’s spread th...»