Sergey Esenin
Easter

After the snow, the piles of drying clay.
The foothills sprout a mushroom mass.
The wind is dancing about the plain,
Like an affectionate red ass.

Of pine and willow smells the air;
Heaven slumbers now, and now sighs.
In the pulpit of the forest there
A sparrow reads his Psaltery.

Last year’s leaves litter the ravine
Beneath the shrubs, a copper mass,
And a man in a smock of sunshine
Rides by on the russet ass.

Softer than flax is His hair,
But clouded his face and manner.
The fir-trees bow before him there,
And greet him with Hosanna!

Translated by Geoffrey Thurley