Zinaida Gippius
Autumn

Longer, darker Are the cold nights,
But the days keep getting shorter,
And the sky — lighter.
The distant thistle
Grows more sparse and dry,
And the wind in the sedge,
Where the shore is high,
Is more drawling and hollow.
The water cools,
The dam is silenced,
And the heavy ooze
Settles to the bottom.
With vacant eyes
Autumn boldly
Gazes through the trunks
Of pensive pines,
Of golden birches,
Straight, with fragile leaves —
And, like the Fates,
Weaves and entwines
The strand of a gray web
Along the clusters of rowan trees,
And soothingly beckons
Into the depths of the dreamy park...
There dusk abides, and sweetness.
Everything heeds Autumn,
And a peaceful joy
Embraces my soul.
I welcome death
With delirious delight,
I’ve no need, no need
For immortality’s tortures!
The final shadows
Of final visions,
Of living exhaustions
Float, slip away —
Incorporeal — they melt —
Before eternal rest...
Let me doze neath the earth
Without visions,
Resigned to peace,
In endless slumber...

Translated by Temira Pachmuss