By Joseph Brodsky
The English Poetic Renditions, by Anna Polibina-Polansky
At the Dusk
The haystock's touched up, by snow.
Through holes beyond, it's sown.
My shovel found a fly
Under the hay, yet alive.
So the little fly meant
Here, all winter, to spend.
It watched the bat
Of the petrol lamp, smoking bad.
The timber wall
Is lit. The dust is small,
But I see its pollen, more clearly
Than my palm, than fire appearing.
Among the evening haze
We two stand alone, amazed.
Warm are my fingers and face
As deep in June, those days.
1965/tr. 2020
Singing under No Music (3)
Scholastic, you will say. So hide
We our woe, there in logics.
The game of no shame, nor pride.
A star above the sea, our fortune...
It is a swelling from the ray
There in the space. I meant, trite prose.
So of that star, I dare say.
A question's mystically posed.
Perhaps, scholastical and moot
Are those sunken confirmations.
What's cinical? I groom the moods,
The shades of spirit's proclamations.
The consequence is blankly kept
From reasons leading to its fullness.
The winter thaws. The night, I cast.
I go to sleep. The spring's too cool, yet.
1970/tr. 2020
14.10.2020 | Anna Polibina-Polansky's blog