Marina Tsvetaeva
And — the embankment. Still I embrace...

From 'Poem of the End'

3

And — the embankment. Still I embrace
The water like a solid thickness.
The gardens of Semiramis,
The hanging ones: your likeness.

I hug the water's steely bar,
The colour of corpses, ashen,
Like singers hugging a music score
Or blind men grasping

A railing?.. Won't you give back? Not if I first
Bend down? Then will you hear me?
I clutch the assuageress of all thirst
As rain-gutters are clutched, sheerly,

By sleepwalkers...
                           No river spawned
This chill — I was born a Naiad!
To clutch the river like the hand
When one's lover is beside

One, and faithful... They're faithful, the dead.
Yes, but we can't all lie in boxes...
Death's on my left. On my right side,
You. My right side is like a corpse's.

A burst of astounding light stands still.
A laugh like a cheap tambourine.
«You and I we ought to...
                                        (Chill.)
Are we going to be strong, then?»

Translated by David McDuff