Sophia Parnok
And truly, one cannot predict...

And truly, one cannot predict
Who in the world will be one’s reader:
A ball can’t know what it will hit
Once it’s shot into the distance.

Well, then, my life-creating verse,
Whom I breathe and in whom I live,
Fly off into darkness, into the void,
Or simply, into the secret drawer!

Our path was blocked at midpoint by
A cruel century. But we’re not complaining, –
Let it be! And yet, and in the main, it’s
A splendid thing, this century!

Perhaps it has no use for verse,
Or for names and patronymics,
Or for separate lonelinesses, –
Still, it kneads the mash of centuries!

Translated by Diana Lewis Burgin