Maximilian Voloshin
The Burial

Underground... Graven ossuaries.
Choir echo; vigil chants and pleas.
Rustling leaves of palms and rosemaries,
Scent of candle wax. Decay and peace...

Here are cathedrals' roots of stone.
Here I am summoned, dust and fume;
Be a seed, dissolve in crumbling loam,
Rise as a cathedral young in bloom!

Leather-bound tome of days and hours,
Forehead arch and spinal chain released
I shall lay like sacrificial flowers,
Like the colored garlands of the feast.

Wearing not the garment worth the afters,
Seeking earthly love in earthly dearth,
I partake of humble clay that suffers,
The forbearing substance of the earth.

Son's love — eyesight — I am bringing here
Like a pair of doves into the ark.
Take my blood to render crystal clear
The unholy wellspring of the dark.

Translated by Alexey Romanovsky