Consolation
It’s not in wise man’s recollection,
Not in a poet’s sweet refrain,
Not in a hero’s daring action,
Not in a hermit’s silent strain.
But contrary to grievance tending
To cover all divine with slime,
Behold: it’s in the sun ascending
On golden canvases of sky.
Each year the Spring brings up the flowers
Forgetting all the heavy thoughts,
And greedily absorbing powers,
The seeds are rushing to explode.
The shoots are burst with mystic forces
And soon the leaves are born on trees –
In learning how to worship roses
They’re taking lessons from the breeze.
The soul has made its sacred circle;
And coming back to childish dreams,
Just like my savage primal fathers,
I worship trees, and stars, and streams.
1920
To an artist
You should be all-understanding,
flexible, unsteady, changing,
as a running ocean wave,
unfastidious and suave , —
welcome all that come to pass,
leaning, touching, encompass
whether you accept or not.
Be impassive, apathetic,
all-departing, anaesthetic
as a running ocean wave,
have no shelter and no trace, —
daytime, nighttime, dawn you see
every time in different place,
with the only dream in mind:
to the sea, the sea, the sea!
1905
© Trans. by V.Postnikov, 2006