A moon gate in my wall: собрание стихотворений

She doesn't talk, and she is calm once more,
but joy will not return to her again:
the day dam p earth was thrown into his grave
— that day joy took leave of her for good.

She doesn't talk — and now her very soul

is empty, like a shrine above a grave,
where day and night burns an eternal flame
lighted above the silent sepulchre.

[1960s]

598 Мария Визи. «В одном моем привычном сне…»

In one of my familiar dreams
there is a place that is so strange,
a stillness, where the sunlight beams
upon a peaceful mountain range.

Green stands a peak, and others crowd

as far away as eye can see,
while in the sky a silver cloud
patterns its fragile filigree.

And there upon the slope I stand,

but shall I triumph or deplore
that in this meditative land
I do not need you any more?

1957

599. Мария Визи. «Вот бредем пустым суходолом…»

We roam a waterless valley
— but are we asleep or awake?
The wind stirs the treetops above us
with its ragged hem in its wake.

Here once a stream was running,

but its source has long been dry.
Only the sting of the half-moon
and desert's fathomless sigh.

From grandfathers' fairytales

— there once was a source, we know.
But we can't recall, half-dreaming,
when? and where did it flow?

We are lost. We are searching for landmarks.

Our hearts in their last despair
are poorer than starving beggars
that stand in the city square.

5 Dec. 1967

600. Николай Гумилев(1886–1921). «У меня не живут цветы…» [269]

Flowers never live in my house,
but a minute they soothe the eye,
in a couple of days they die;
flowers never live in my house.

Birds either don't live here long,

only ruff their feathers and frown,
and by morning — a ball of down…
Even birds do not live here long.

Only volumes in eight long rows,

silent volumes of many pages,
guard the languorous thought of ages,
like teeth, in eight long rows.

The man who sold them to me,

I recall, was hunch-backed and poor…
…By the graveyard he kept his store,
did the man who sold them to me.

[1930s]

601. Николай Гумилев(1886–1921). Свиданье [270]