Marina Tsvetaeva
Girlfriend. 3. Today, somehow, I absorbed it all...

Today, somehow, I absorbed it all.
Today I stood by the window, calm
and idle, clear-seeing,
nothing weighed on my heart,
joyful—if to be so calm is joy.

I don’t know how it happened.
It must have been because my soul
was too tired to feel further.
Somehow I didn’t even care to trouble
my rebel pen that lay there
refusing to write any lines worth keeping.

I stood like that by the window,
alert though dazed, as in an invisible haze,
not feeling good or bad or anything,
softly drumming on the pane with a fingertip,
to hear its deep dull ping.

I didn’t feel any better or lesser
than anything else, than, for instance,
the puddles shimmering like mother of pearl,
reflecting a silvery mix of clouds and brightness,
as though they were pools of spilt sky—

or the bird blurring by—the ordinary dog
trotting past. I felt wondrously nothing,
an opiated sameness. Not even
the heartbreaking song of the beggar woman
tempted a tear.

Somehow my soul
had absorbed the sweet skill
and anaesthetic art of detachment.
After what I felt yesterday
nothing makes any impression.

Translated by Seraphina Powell