I view the promised land before me, —
Gleaming of waters, tents of trees.
But anger of the Lord forbore me
To touch the dower I long to seize.
I rose from heat and sandy places,
I tasted death in living hours:
My strength so wanes, that it effaces
Within my soul all placid powers.
And if my mournful-tuned ovation
Is chanted to that glad domain,
I shape a hymn of salutation,
Not for my own, but others' gain.
Я вижу край обетованный,
Сверканье вод, шатры дерев.
Но преступить предлог желанный
Мне запретил Господний гнев.
Устал я от песков и зноя,
Еще при жизни смерть вкусил.
Так изнемог, что для покоя
В моей душе нет больше сил.
И если радостному краю
Поет привет мой грустный стих,
Я гимн приветственный слагаю
Не для себя, а для других.
«To tell the truth, I'm kin / to the house cricket. / I sing a secret song / above the oven's ash. / For me, one brings / the water to a fierce boil, / For me, another / prepares a hearth of gold. A traveler will recall / ...»
«Every second of our time together / We exulted, as if it were epiphany, / We two alone in the world. Lighter / And braver than a bird’s wing, / You flew down the stairs / Like dizziness, skipping half of them, / Through wet lilacs into your realm / On the other side of the mirror. ...»
«Here, a house once stood. Inside, some old man / lived with a child. And now the house is gone. A hundred kilo bomb — the earth, blacker than black. / A home, now none. That’s war; what can be done? On a heap of gray rags, a samovar gleams. / A dresser, nearby a horse. Above the horse, ...»
«The gun battery was over there, behind that hill. / We cannot hear it, but its thunder remains still, / around us, the corpses lie beneath the snow, / and in the icy air, their arms are still flailing. / Who would dare to trample this field now? / Today, the dead ones rise again. Now they...»