Yaroslav Smelyakov
A Lovely Young Maiden Named Lida

In front of the little white houses
Where blooming trees make the air sweet,
A lovely young maiden named Lida
Lives there in her house on South Street.

The gold of her hair is all braided
In tresses bound up tight as tight.
On her dress, on the blue cotton fabric
Little flowers wink in, out of sight.

And only imagine that April,
That red-headed trickster at play,
Has sprinkled a pollen of freckles
Upon her in bed as she lay.

Not in vain, with their cheerful approval
Do neighbors from windows espy
Whenever to school in the mornings
She, satchel in hand, passes by.

Reflected in each of their windows
She walks through the world at her ease,
This lovely young maiden named Lida…
But lovely? How so, if you please?

Go ask that young boy to answer,
Her neighbor who lives near the lake.
He falls asleep thinking of Lida,
And “Lida” he thinks when he wakes.

There’s a reason that once, on the sidewalk
Where she, in her little boots, walked,
“Ah, lovely young maiden named Lida!”
Despairing, he wrote with his chalk.

There’s no getting through to a boy
Whose ardor all reason must spurn.
So Pushkin once fell for Natasha;
So Heine must also have burned.

The lad will grow up and go wandering,
And far from home will he find fame.
It turns out that one single sidewalk
Gives too little scope for his flame.

Ah, lovers! No obstacle daunts them!
Timidity? Shyness? For shame!
On every road under heaven
The boy will blazon her name.

The South Pole? He writes there with firelight;
With wheat, on the steppes of Kuban;
In green Russian meadows, with flowers
With sea-foam, afloat on the brine.

He climbs to the stars in the nighttime,
His fingers he’ll burn, one and all,
But soon a brand new constellation
The stargazers “Lida” will call.

And so may it shine in the nighttime,
To sweeten, O Moscow, your dreams.
On midnight-blue star-studded pages
May his words in their beauty e’er gleam.

Translated by Redneck Peril