A poem by Alexander Pushkin – Pouchkine, Pooshkin (1799-1837), in English translation
FROM “EUGENE ONIEGIN”
I write to you . . . when that is said
What more is left for me to say ?
Now you are free (I know too well)
To heap contempt upon my head.
Yet if some sparks of pity dwell
Within your breast you’ll surely not
Abandon me to my hard lot.
When first I saw you I desired
To hold my peace : my shame (’tis true)
Would ne’er have been revealed to you
Had life’s conditions but inspired
One gleam of hope that you would come
To see us in our country home
From time to time, so that I might
Hear but one word, catch but one tone,
And live by dreaming on alone
Till our next meeting, day and night.
But then it seemed there was no hope;
Our rustic quiet bored you so,
Folk said you were a misanthrope;
And we-we do not make a show-
You found us narrow in our scope.
Why did you come to visit us
I n this forgotten quiet place ?
I need not have been tortured thus
If I had never seen your face.
My inexperienced heart maybe
Had grown resigned to this dull life,
And future years had brought to me
Some other love-my destiny
An honoured mother and true wife.
Another’s! Nay, to none on earth
Could I have given this heart of mine.
By the decree of the Most High,
And by Heaven’s willing, I am thine.
Allotted unto you was I
E’en from the moment of my birth
And loyal to my future fate;
And God, I know, sent you to be
My champion and my advocate
Till the grave closes over me. . . .
Oft in my dreams you did appear;
I loved you then before the days
When palpably I saw you here ;
I languished in your wondrous gaze
And in my heart your voice rang clear
Long since. … It was no dream to me!
You came-at once I understood
This swift confusion in my blood,
While my thoughts whispered : ” Lo, ’tis he.”
Was it not true ? Am I not sure
You spoke with me in hours of peace
When I went visiting my poor,
Or when I strove by prayer to ease
The pain in which my spirit toss’d ?
Was not your image wont to rise
A vision sweet-too quickly lost-
To light my gloom ? Did not mine eyes
See you bend gently o’er my bed ?
Were not some words low whispered
Of love and hope ? Now in what guise
Come you ? As guardian angel good,
Or tempter in some wily mood ?
0 speak, and set my doubts at rest!
What if all this should prove at best
The empty dream, more light than froth,
Of a heart simple and untried ?
Well, be it so! But from henceforth
I must to you my fate confide.
Must weep my tears about your feet
And for your sheltering love entreat.
Picture me now. … I sit alone
With none to heed or guess what ails . . .
And now my very reason fails!
I wait for you. One glance of yours
Fresh hope unto my heart restores;
Or else the cruel dream comes back
Of merited contempt. . . . Alack!
[She seals the letter.]
‘Tis done! I scarce dare read it through,
But overcome with shame and fright
I trust my honour now to you,
And dare to think I trust aright.
A few random poems:
- The Wound-Dresser by Walt Whitman
- Robert Burns: Raving Winds Around Her Blowing: I composed these verses on Miss Isabella M’Leod of Raza, alluding to her feelings on the death of her sister, and the still more melancholy death of her sister’s husband, the late Earl of Loudoun, who shot himself out of sheer heart-break at some mortifications he suffered, owing to the deranged state of his finances.-R.B., 1971.
- Follow Me ‘ome by Rudyard Kipling
- Нина Воронель – Дождливый рассвет
- Владимир Британишский – Дом (Время ведь с годами ведь)
- К нам приходит в день февральский снежною тропой
- Answer To A Sonnet By J.H.Reynolds poem – John Keats poems
- Xai Kou1
- Appeal by Ndue Ukaj
- Юнна Мориц – В цирке
- Champagne 1914 15
- Emperors And Kings, How Oft Have Temples Rung by William Wordsworth
- Petrarchan Sonnet: If no one else breathed in this wide, wide world by T. Wignesan
- How to Become an Inspiration
- Ask Me by William Stafford
External links
Bat’s Poetry Page – more poetry by Fledermaus
Talking Writing Monster’s Page –
Batty Writing – the bat’s idle chatter, thoughts, ideas and observations, all original, all fresh
Poems in English
- To Gnedich poem – Alexander Pushkin
- To The Don poem – Alexander Pushkin
- To Natasha poem – Alexander Pushkin
- To Lily poem – Alexander Pushkin
- To… (Kern) poem – Alexander Pushkin
- To Chadaev poem – Alexander Pushkin
- Thou and You poem – Alexander Pushkin
- The wondrous moment of our meeting… poem – Alexander Pushkin
- The Wish poem – Alexander Pushkin
- The Water-Nymph poem – Alexander Pushkin
- The Upas Tree poem – Alexander Pushkin
- The Talisman poem – Alexander Pushkin
- The Singer poem – Alexander Pushkin
- The Prophet poem – Alexander Pushkin
- The Night poem – Alexander Pushkin
- The Name poem – Alexander Pushkin
- The Flower poem – Alexander Pushkin
- The Drowned Man poem – Alexander Pushkin
- The Dream poem – Alexander Pushkin
- The Vision poem – Alexander Pushkin
More external links (open in a new tab):
Doska or the Board – write anything
Search engines:
Yandex – the best search engine for searches in Russian (and the best overall image search engine, in any language, anywhere)
Qwant – the best search engine for searches in French, German as well as Romance and Germanic languages.
Ecosia – a search engine that supposedly… plants trees
Duckduckgo – the real alternative and a search engine that actually works. Without much censorship or partisan politics.
Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.
Parallel Translations of Poetry
The Poetry Repository – an online library of poems, poetry, verse and poetic works
Alexander Pushkin (1799-1937) was a Russian poet, playwright and prose writer, founder of the realistic trend in Russian literature, literary critic and theorist of literature, historian, publicist, journalist; one of the most important cultural figures in Russia in the first third of the 19th century.