Pavillions spread over the square,
The maple leaves kiss the stars.
It's night — a celebration there,
Merriment and festivity in the park.
But when a pyrotechnist hurls
A silvery light from tree-tops to sky,
Poet, don't put your trust
In the night's fantastic bursts.
The rocket will fly off and die,
Its fiery sparks will grow dim...
But a poet's heart shines forever
In the pure depths of a poem.
Расступились на площади зданья,
Листья клена целуют звезду.
Нынче ночью - большое гулянье,
И веселье, и праздник в саду.
Но когда пиротехник из рощи
Бросит в небо серебряный свет,
Фантастическим выстрелам ночи
Не вполне доверяйся, поэт.
Улетит и погаснет ракета,
Потускнеют огней вороха...
Вечно светит лишь сердце поэта
В целомудренной бездне стиха.
«I have come back to my city, familiar to the point of tears, / To the blood in my veins, to my childhood’s swollen tonsils. / You have come back here — so swallow up quickly / The cod-liver-oil of the Leningrad river-lamps: Quickly make up your mind to the short December day / When the ...»
«For the rattling valour of future centuries, / For the highborn tribe of people, / I am deprived of the cups on the pyres of my fathers, / Of their pleasures, of their marks of esteem. Like a wolfhound the century leaps on my shoulders, / But my skin is not the skin of a wolf. / Stuff me ...»
«Joyously take, from the palm of my hand / this gift--some honey and some sun, / as the bees of Persephone command us. Not to be loosened, the unmoored boat; / not to be heard, steps of shadow on fur; / not to be overcome, the thick fear of the forest in which we live. We have only kiss...»
«— She’s on the bottom, with the silt / And water-weeds... To sleep with them / She left,—but even there, finds no sleep! / — But I loved her / As forty thousand brothers / Could never love her! / — Hamlet! She’s on the botto...»