Nikolay Klyuev
Don’t think that the demons are winged...

Don’t think that the demons are winged,
For they have a bladder like fish.
They’re fond of mute, desolate sunsets,
And the ocean’s expanse at midnight.

They swim after boats like a shark-pack.
The cheek bones of rocks undersea
Are shelter for their hellish spirits,
As if they were greedy octopi.

They’re demons of smile and of silence,
Of sleep, of the bolt on the door...
In grave — also in baby cradle
There they seethe — in their own fiery wave.

The flocks of the small demons gather
In cuckoos, in a spinning song.
The bony fears of the old women
Guarantee us that Hell is quite close.

O, Mountains, fall down here upon us!
And gorges, come cover us up!
A thundery tale has been written
On an aphis and hoof of an ox.

At feasts, at the meal of a beggar,
Horned shadows rise up everywhere...
For whom, then, do angels at sunset
Weave their paradise hems and kerchiefs?

Translated by Vladimir Markov and Merrill Sparks