Sergey Esenin
Let’s sit down close by, darling...

Let’s sit down close by, darling,
Let your eyes encounter mine.
I would like to feel my heart wheel
To the meekness of your eyes.

Both this lavish gold of autumn
And the blondish of a hair tress –
Every little thing has cropped in
To relieve a restless scapegrace.

I have long since left my home place,
Wherein groves and meadows flourish.
Planned to live, remaining worthless,
In an urban bitter glory.

Planned to have my heart remind me
Summer gardens ever rarer,
Where I grew myself a rhymer
To the tunes of froggy carols.

It is autumn also, out there…
Through the windows, limes and maples
Poke the rooms with leafy scions,
Seeking those who they remember.

Those have long been off their courses,
And the Moon above God's Acre,
With its beams, marks out the crosses,
Prodding, we're to join them later.

Having ended earthly worries,
We'll resettle under those crests.
All meandering life pathways
Give the living only solace.

Do sit down close by, darling,
Let your eyes encounter mine.
I would like to feel my heart wheel
To the meekness of your eyes.

Translated by Vyacheslav Chetin