...No grass ever grows
Making baskets for us
Is their lives’ sole purpose —
Making baskets from the straw,
Weightless basket service.
On the moon, twilight looms
Houses are neater
On the moon, no homes,
Only pigeon quarters
Bluish homes — bluish homes —
Wondrous pigeon quarters...
…На луне не растёт
Ни одной былинки;
На луне весь народ
Делает корзинки —
Из соломы плетёт
Легкие корзинки.
На луне — полутьма
И дома опрятней;
На луне не дома —
Просто голубятни;
Голубые дома —
Чудо-голубятни.
«Along that road where brave Donskoi / once led his mighty host to war, / where the wind's mindful of the foe, / the moon's a crescent of yellow, / I walked as if in ocean deep... / The sweet briar so perfumed the air / as if 't were speech itself so rare; / and I was apt at last to mee...»
«Delightful, after all the wind and frost / to warm myself beside the fire; / but there I failed to guard my heart / and someone stole it in desire. The New Year celebrations linger, / the roses' stems are soft and moist; / but in my breast no longer sings / the whirring of dragonflies' ...»
«Did he send no swan for me, / did he send no boat, no dark raft? / He promised in the spring of 'sixteen / that he would come without delay. / I'd fly to him like a bird in the spring / of nineteen sixteen, he said. / Through darkness and death I'd come to his perch / and touch his sho...»
«I pray to the slender shaft of light / that pierces the window, pale and straight. / Since morning I have not spoken; / today my heart in two is broken. / The shiny brass on my wash-stand / has turned to verdigris of late. Yet the light that plays upon it / is a gladness to behold. / ...»