Not to set fire to myself
or be burned like Avvakum,
I do what I can
to chase away thought.
I now orbit the earth
in low-level flight,
life’s burdens and vanities
far out of sight.
Чтоб не быть самосожженцем,
Или Аввакумом,
Я усилием последним
Прогоняю думы.
Я на бреющем полете
Землю облетаю,
И тщеты земной заботы
Я теперь не знаю.
«The cold wind from a lagoon. / The silent coffins of gondolas. / I, in that night — so ill, and young so — / Had stretched myself against a lion. There on tower, with a song irony, / The giants tolls in that night hour. / Mark sank in the lagoon, all moonlit, / Iconostas, patterned...»
«There fades the boom of life, quite teasing, / And back is the affairs' tide. / But wind through a black velvet's singing / About the future and somewhere's life. Where shall I wake? In other country? / Not in this gloomy land, isn't it? / And won't I be just abundant / To recollect thi...»
«All on the earth will die — and youth and mother, / Wife will betray you, leave once faithful friend, / But you learn to enjoy the bliss another — / Look in a mirror of the polar land. Get on your bark, sail to the distant Pole / In walls of ice — and bit by bit forget / How they l...»
«I’m sick, for sure: deep darkness holds my heart, / I’m bored with the people and the stories, / And dream of treasures of the kingdoms, glories, / And yataghans, all covered with blood. It seems to me – and this is no fraud – / A Tartar, squint, was one of my begetters, / That fi...»