From a Wayfarer's Letters
II
I have treated my heart with a ruthless abandon
In poetry, in friendship, in grief and in passion.
Forgive me, my darling. Let bygones be bygones.
I suffer. Yet all this is joy in its fashion.
And even my black fits of burning depression,
The starting at shadows, the nervous reaction
To trifles which nourish my fearful obsession
With doom and disastei, are joy in their fashion.
I care not if I choke on these tears' salt insurgence,
Reproaches may flay me, like wet branches lashing.
More fearful by far are indifference, indulgence.
Love never forgives, yet is joy—in its fashion.
For love brooks no rival, expects no compassion.
Love — now I know it — can kill and destroy,
Just so long as it's beautiful, live and impassioned,
Just so long as it's not a mere pastime, but joy.
Я сердце своё никогда не щадила:
Ни в песне, ни в дружбе, ни в ни в страсти…
Прости меня, милый. Что было, то было
Мне горько. И всё-таки всё это — счастье.
И то, что я страстно, горюче тоскую,
И то, что, страшась небывалой напасти,
На призрак, на малую тень негодую.
Мне страшно… И всё-таки всё это — счастье.
Пускай эти слёзы и это удушье,
Пусть хлещут упрёки, как ветки в ненастье.
Страшней — всепрощенье. Страшней — равнодушье.
Любовь не прощает. И всё это — счастье.
Я знаю теперь, что она убивает,
Не ждёт состраданья, не делится властью.
Покуда прекрасна, покуда живая,
Покуда она не утеха, а — счастье.
«Going to war, the word "Marina" / Within your cutlass you did draft. / In your magnificent existence / I was your first one and your last. A night and pre-dawn I remember / In hell of the soldiers' rail car. / In chest I keep the shoulder pieces / And in the wind I rush my hair.»
«1 White army, your way's a high one: / Temple and chest — to the black gun. White and divine is your cause: / Your white body — into the sand. Not a flock of swans in the sky: / The sacred white army / Melts, melts with white sight.. The last dream of the old world: / Youth — V...»
«2 Who has survived will die, who has died will arise. / And now descendants, remember the times long gone: / Where were you? The question will roar like thunder, / Like thunder will roar the answer: On the Don! "What did you do" "We were accepting torments, / Then grew tired and to sleep ...»
«3 Waves and youth — outside the law! / Don has moved — we die — we drown. / We ask the wind of time to bear / To grandsons a wicked rumour: Yes! Broke the Don's ice! / The white army — Yes! — died. / But with children and wives parting, / But on Don departing, With a whi...»