Freedom is a wondrous marvel
Sweet to crave in candlelight.
“Stay with me before you travel,”
Cried Devotion in the night,
“You are crowned by me alone.
Hold your freedom in regard
As a law that’s carved in stone;
Heed it with a loving heart…”
“As a law that’s carved in stone,
Freedom I betroth to wed.
That light crown will then alone
Always stay upon my head.
Doomed to death and aimless motion
Out in space – why would we be
Sad for wonderful devotion,
Wistful over constancy!“
О свободе небывалой
Сладко думать у свечи.
— Ты побудь со мной, сначала, —
Верность плакала в ночи.
— Только я мою корону
Возлагаю на тебя,
Чтоб свободе, как закону,
Подчинился ты, любя…
— Я свободе, как закону,
Обручен, и потому
Эту легкую корону
Никогда я не сниму.
Нам ли, брошенным в пространстве,
Обреченным умереть,
О прекрасном постоянстве
И о верности жалеть!
«From "Sibyl" 3. Sibyl to the Infant: Child, cling / To my breast: / Birth is a falling into days. From the nowhere cliffs beyond the clouds, / My infant, / How low you fell! / You were spirit, you became dust. Cry, o little one, for them and for us: / Birth is a falling into hours!...»
«In the sweet, Atlantic / Breathing of spring / My curtain's like a butterfly, / Huge, fluttering Like a Hindu widow / To a pyre's golden blaze, / Like a drowsy Naiad / To past-window seas.»
«I smeared the weekday map, in passing, / while splashing paint from a glass; / revealed upon a plate of aspic / the ocean’s angled cheeks at last. / In scales of a tin fish, hidden, / I’ve read the calls of lips yet mute. / Could you / have played a noctu...»
«From rooftops, tears seeped into pipes / and to the river’s arm drew streaks, / while lips, suspended from the skies, / continued sucking on stone teats. The sky, relaxed, could now see clearly: / along the sea's resplendent channel, / the sweating cameleer drove wearily / The Neva’...»