Marina Tsvetaeva
Girlfriend. 12. The hills near Moscow look blue from this distance...

The hills near Moscow look blue from this distance,
there’s a little more warmth in the air—
along with the dust from the roads
now dry, though the first thaw made them mud—
there’s also the smell of tar from the kilns
where they sweat it from birch bark and pine.
I sleep away the days, waste whole days
stupidly grinning—it must mean I’m finally
convalescing from winter.

Maybe I do take my way
unhurriedly home, not worried
that I’m not writing poems. So what?
The sound of wagon wheels rattling,
the taste of fresh-roasted almonds,
these mean more to me now than all my stanzas.

My head is deliciously empty
because my heart is too full!
I watch my days go by, as if I stood on a bridge
watching little ripples pass below.

There is a certain someone
giving me very warm looks already
though the air hasn’t even lost its early spring cool…
I’ve barely recovered from winter
and I’m already coming down
with a bad case of summer.

Translated by Seraphina Powell