Eugene Oneguine [Onegin]. A Romance of Russian Life in Verse

Perchance to benefit mankind, 
Or but for fame he saw the light; 
His lyre, to silence now consigned, 
Resounding through all ages might 
Have echoed to eternity. 
With worldly honours, it may be, 
Fortune the poet had repaid. 
It may be that his martyred shade 
Carried a truth divine away; 
That, for the century designed, 
Had perished a creative mind, 
And past the threshold of decay, 
He ne'er shall hear Time's eulogy, 
The blessings of humanity.

XXXVI

Or, it may be, the bard had passed 
A life in common with the rest; 
Vanished his youthful years at last, 
The fire extinguished in his breast, 
In many things had changed his life— 
The Muse abandoned, ta'en a wife, 
Inhabited the country, clad 
In dressing-gown, a cuckold glad:

A life of fact, not fiction, led— 

At forty suffered from the gout, 
Eaten, drunk, gossiped and grown stout: 
And finally, upon his bed 
Had finished life amid his sons, 
Doctors and women, sobs and groans.

XXXVII

But, howsoe'er his lot were cast, 
Alas! the youthful lover slain, 
Poetical enthusiast, 
A friendly hand thy life hath ta'en!

There is a spot the village near 

Where dwelt the Muses' worshipper, 
Two pines have joined their tangled roots, 
A rivulet beneath them shoots 
Its waters to the neighbouring vale. 
There the tired ploughman loves to lie, 
The reaping girls approach and ply 
Within its wave the sounding pail, 
And by that shady rivulet 
A simple tombstone hath been set.

XXXVIII

There, when the rains of spring we mark 
Upon the meadows showering, 
The shepherd plaits his shoe of bark,[69]
Of Volga fishermen doth sing, 
And the young damsel from the town, 
For summer to the country flown, 
Whene'er across the plain at speed 
Alone she gallops on her steed, 
Stops at the tomb in passing by; 
The tightened leathern rein she draws, 
Aside she casts her veil of gauze 
And reads with rapid eager eye 
The simple epitaph—a tear 
Doth in her gentle eye appear.

XXXIX

And meditative from the spot 
She leisurely away doth ride, 
Spite of herself with Lenski's lot 
Longtime her mind is occupied.

She muses: "What was Olga's fate? 

Longtime was her heart desolate 
Or did her tears soon cease to flow? 
And where may be her sister now?

Where is the outlaw, banned by men, 

Of fashionable dames the foe, 
The misanthrope of gloomy brow, 
By whom the youthful bard was slain?"—

In time I'll give ye without fail 

A true account and in detail.

XL