And the old chief perceived this city proud,
He’d seen in times that are in sagas sung.
Set all to fire! The king listed else
The towers, the gates, the temples – rich and thriving…
But sank in thoughts, and said with lighted face,
‘You just provide the Bard Home’s surviving.’
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Not under foreign skies
I shared all this with my own peopleThere, where misfortune had abandoned us.[1961]INSTEAD OF A PREFACEDuring the frightening years of the Yezhov terror, Ispent seventeen months waiting in prison queues inLeningrad. One day, somehow, someone ‘picked me out’.On that occasion there was a woman standing behind me,her lips blue with cold, who, of course, had…
I hear the oriole’s always-grieving voice,
In the sickle’s serpentine hissCutting the corn’s ear tightly pressed to ear.And the short skirts of the slim reapersFly in the wind like holiday pennants,The clash of joyful cymbals, and creepingFrom under dusty lashes, the long glance.I don’t expect love’s tender flatteries,In premonition of some dark event,But come, come and see this paradiseWhere together we…
So again we triumph!
Our speeches silent,Our words, dumb.Our eyes that have not metAgain, are lost;And only tears forgetThe grip of frost.A wild-rose bush near MoscowKnows something ofThis pain that will be calledImmortal love.
To The Londoners
(From the ‘In the Fortieth Year’)1940The twenty-fourth drama of ShakespeareTime’s writing with its indifferent hand.We, selves, the guests of the awful Feast here,Better would read Hamlet, Caesar, and LearOver the river, in heavy lead clad;Better – to bear, with singing and torches,Juliet, the dove, to her family’s graves,Peep into windows of Macbeth’s castle godless,Tremble with…
And the stone word fell
Never mind, I was ready.I will manage somehow.Today I have so much to do:I must kill memory once and for all,I must turn my soul to stone,I must learn to live again—Unless . . . Summer’s ardent rustlingIs like a festival outside my window.For a long time I’ve foreseen thisBrilliant day, deserted house.
He did love three things in this world:
And worn, weathered maps of America.And he did not love children crying,Or tea served with raspberries,Or woman’s hysteria.…And I was his wife.