Once again I am bending my knees before you,
Having noticed your garland of stars far apace.
Let me know, dear Christ, that not all things are ghosts,
Allow me, at last, not a ghost to embrace!
I am tormented by these long days. With no worry,
With no aim, in half-darkness, I am so lost..
I can love ghosts, but can one survive on this planet
For eighteen years solely on ghosts?
And they sing, and they write, joy is in the beginning!
Blossom with your full jubilant soul!
Isn't it true, there's no happiness without sorrow?
I don't have any friends save the dead, none at all.
Those enflamed with another belief for all time, is it so,
From the world in empty desert had hid?
No, I don't need the smiles gained at the cost
Of profaning the highest shrines of my creed.
I don't need bliss that comes at the price of debasement.
I don't need love! I'm sorrowful — not for her.
In the quiet kingdom of beloved ghosts, only ghosts —
Give me my soul to give back, Savior!
И опять пред Тобой я склоняю колени,
В отдаленьи завидев Твой звёздный венец.
Дай понять мне, Христос, что не всё только тени
Дай не тень мне обнять, наконец!
Я измучена этими длинными днями
Без заботы, без цели, всегда в полумгле…
Можно тени любить, но живут ли тенями
Восемнадцати лет на земле?
И поют ведь, и пишут, что счастье вначале!
Расцвести всей душой бы ликующей, всей!
Но не правда ль: ведь счастия нет, вне печали?
Кроме мёртвых, ведь нету друзей?
Ведь от века зажжённые верой иною
Укрывались от мира в безлюдьи пустынь?
Нет, не надо улыбок, добытых ценою
Осквернения высших святынь.
Мне не надо блаженства ценой унижений.
Мне не надо любви! Я грущу — не о ней.
Дай мне душу, Спаситель, отдать — только тени
В тихом царстве любимых теней.
«Why is it that you still beguile me — / As wind, stone, bird — and all the likes? / Why is that you smile on me — / With sudden summer lightning strikes? Don’t touch me, let’s not start anew! / I’ll tend to my prophetic ways… / A drunken fire staggers through / The swamp ...»
«The empty skies with a transparent gloss, / The structure of the prison, large and white, / The song in the Procession of the Cross / Over Volkhov, that turns blue in the light. September’s gale strips the birches’ torsos, / Beats in the branches, hollering, irate, / This city’s sti...»
«I Smell of burning. The marshes are singeing / For four weeks, with the peat bog dried up. / And today, even birds have quit singing / And the aspen that shivered has stopped. God, Himself, sees the sun with dismay, / And since Easter, the drought has spread. / And a one-legged stranger ...»
«That voice, with silence disputing, / Has triumphed a little bit more. / Like sorrow or song in me brooding / Is the winter before the war. It was whiter than Smolny Cathedral, / More mysterious than Summer Garden. / Now, we look back at it, so ethereal, / With ultimate longing, downtro...»