Search for me in transparent spring light,
I’m like wings, imperceptibly close,
I’m a sigh, I’m a sound, a sunbeam inside,
but I’m lighter than it: it is here, and I was.
There’s no parting between us, dear friend!
Hear me now, I’m here. I am traced
by your living and shivering hand
that has stretched through the day’s molten blaze.
So slow down. As if accidentally,
shut your eyes. And I’ll strain all the same —
on your fingertips, shaking so gently,
maybe then I will flare up as a flame…
Ищи меня в сквозном весеннем свете.
Я весь — как взмах неощутимых крыл,
Я звук, я вздох, я зайчик на паркете,
Я легче зайчика: он — вот, он есть, я был.
Но, вечный друг, меж нами нет разлуки!
Услышь, я здесь. Касаются меня
Твои живые, трепетные руки,
Простертые в текучий пламень дня.
Помедли так. Закрой, как бы случайно,
Глаза. Еще одно усилье для меня —
И на концах дрожащих пальцев, тайно,
Быть может, вспыхну кисточкой огня.
«Each of your verses is a boil of poison / Like a life that has been burned by sin. / I breathe your verses although I should not, / It’s forbidden to breathe them in. You are a mad poor little boy / Who brought a farewell noise of bells / From some white funeral to spoil / The banquet...»
«How I want to breathe into my verse / All of this world, that changes its countenance: / The ungraspable movement of grass, / The momentary and vague magnificence / Of trees, the itchy and winged / Dry sand, chirping like birds. All this world is beautiful and humpbacked, / Like a tree ...»
«The table they turned toward the light. / I lay head-first like meat on scales. / My soul throbbed on a thread, / I saw myself from outside: / I was balanced without make-weights / By one greasy weight from the bazaar. / That occurred / At the center of a snow shield, / Pock-marked a...»
«When nature and vocabulary start a quarrel / And word strives hard to separate itself from world, / As a mask from a face, a colour from a silhouette, / Am I a beggar or a Tsar? A scythe or mower? But to my world I did not give the names: / Adam cut reed, and I make baskets. / The scythe,...»