At night all rooms are black
Every voice is dark. At night
All beauty of the earth's countries
Are the same — the innocent — the guilty.
And each one talks to the other
At night, the beautiful and the thieves.
Past his house I steal —
Not that it really looks like yours at night!
And your neighbor - strangely unlike,
And on each passing — a knife
And I hang around in impotent rage
Under the huge black trees.
Oh, narrow underground bed
At night, in the dark, at night!
Oh, I'm afraid that I will get up
And whisper, and kiss your lips...
— Pray, dear children, —
For me at the first hour and the third hour.
По ночам все комнаты черны,
Каждый голос тёмен. По ночам
Все красавицы земной страны
Одинаково — невинно — неверны.
И ведут друг с другом разговоры
По ночам красавицы и воры.
Мимо дома своего пойдёшь —
И не тот уж дом твой по ночам!
И сосед твой — странно-непохож,
И за каждою спиною — нож.
И шатаются в бессильном гневе
Чёрные огромные деревья.
Ох, узка подземная кровать
По ночам, по чёрным, по ночам!
Ох, боюсь, что буду я вставать,
И шептать, и в губы целовать…
— Помолитесь, дорогие дети,
За меня в час первый и в час третий.
«Hush, my little sleepy-head. / Mama’s gone — to Paris fled. / Ah-Ah-Ah, please don’t you weep. / There were reasons, go to sleep. / Over there beneath the couch / Crawls a sleek and shiny roach. / Where’s his wife? In Paris, too? / No, she isn’t; that’s not true. / Life h...»
«One night I met, to my surprise, / A puny devil, blue with cold — / No bigger than a child in size, / His feral face was gaunt and old. He shivered in the icy rain, / Which had soaked through his matted pelt. / “This son of hell feels cold and pain — / We share one fate,” I some...»
«I feel the need for someone I can pray to. / Imagine that a common lowly ant / Was overcome by yearning for a way to / Prostrate himself—as humble supplicant. At peace no more, dispirited, frustrated / So all the world appeared to him mundane. / A goddess in his image he created / And...»
«I see that this morning your eyes are especially sad; / Especially slender the arms that encircle your calves / Well, listen, far off to the south on the shores of Lake Chad, / There roams the exquisite giraffe. To him have been given harmonious figure and grace, / His hide is embellished w...»