The Queen of Spades and Selected Works (Pushkin Collection) Read online

  THE HORSE

  Why dost thou neigh, O spirited steed,

  Why thy neck so low,

  Why thy mane unshaken

  Why thy bit not gnawed?

  Do I then not fondle thee?

  Thy grain to eat art thou not free?

  Is not thy harness ornamented,

  Is not thy rein of silk,

  Is not thy shoe of silver,

  Thy stirrup not of gold?

  The steed in sorrow answer gives:

  Hence am I quiet

  Because the distant tramp I hear,

  The trumpet’s blow and the arrow’s whizz

  And hence I neigh, since in the field

  No longer feed I shall,

  Nor in beauty live and fondling,

  Neither shine with harness bright.

  For soon the stem enemy

  My harness whole shall take

  And the shoes of silver

  Tear he shall from feet mine light.

  Hence it is that grieves my spirit:

  That in place of my chaprak

  With thy skin shall cover he

  My perspiring sides.

  1833

  TO A BABE

  CHILD, I dare not over thee

  Pronounce a blessing;

  Thou art of consolation a quiet angel

  May then happy be thy lot...

  THE POET

  ERE the poet summoned is

  To Apollo’s holy sacrifice

  In the world’s empty cares

  Engrossed is half-hearted he.

  His holy lyre silent is

  And cold sleep his soul locks in;

  And of the world’s puny children,

  Of all puniest perhaps is he.

  Yet no sooner the heavenly word

  His keen ear hath reached,

  Than up trembles the singer’s soul

  Like unto an awakened eagle.

  The world’s pastimes him now weary

  And mortals’ gossip now he shuns

  To the feet of popular idol

  His lofty head bends not he.

  Wild and stem, rushes he,

  Of tumult full and sound,

  To the shores of desert wave,

  Into the widely-whispering wood.

  1827

  SONNET: POET, NOT POPULAR APPLAUSE SHALT THOU PRIZE!

  POET, not popular applause shalt thou prize!

  Of raptured praise shall pass the momentary noise;

  The fool’s judgment hear thou shalt, and the cold mob’s laughter —

  Calm stand, and firm be, and — sober!

  Thou art king: live alone. On the free road

  Walk, whither draws thee thy spirit free:

  Ever the fruits of beloved thoughts ripening,

  Never reward for noble deeds demanding.

  In thyself reward seek. Thine own highest court thou art;

  Severest judge, thine own works canst measure.

  Art thou content, O fastidious craftsman?

  Content? Then let the mob scold,

  And spit upon the altar, where blazes thy fire.

  Thy tripod in childlike playfulness let it shake.

  THE THREE SPRINGS

  IN the world’s desert, sombre and shoreless

  Mysteriously three springs have broken thro’:

  Of youth the spring, a boisterous spring and rapid;

  It boils, it runs, it sparkles, and it murmurs.

  The Castalian Spring, with wave of inspiration

  In the world’s deserts its exiles waters;

  The last spring — the cold spring of forgetfulness,

  Of all sweetest, quench it does the heart’s fire.

  1827.

  THE TASK

  THE longed-for moment here is. Ended is my long-yeared task.

  Why then sadness strange me troubles secretly?

  My task done, like needless hireling am I to stand,

  My wage in hand, to other task a stranger?

  Or my task regret I, of night companion silent mine,

  Gold Aurora’s friend, the friend of my sacred household gods?

  1830.

  SLEEPLESSNESS

  I CANNOT sleep, I have no light;

  Darkness ‘bout me, and sleep is slow;

  The beat monotonous alone

  Near me of the clock is heard.

  Of the Fates the womanish babble,

  Of sleeping night the trembling,

  Of life the mice-like running-about, —

  Why disturbing me art thou?

  What art thou, O tedious whisper?

  The reproaches, or the murmur

  Of the day by me misspent?

  What from me wilt thou have?

  Art thou calling or prophesying?

  Thee I wish to understand,

  Thy tongue obscure I study now.

  1830.

  QUESTIONINGS

  USELESS gift, accidental gift,

  Life, why given art thou me?

  Or, why by fate mysterious

  To torture art thou doomed?

  Who with hostile power me

  Out has called from the nought?

  Who my soul with passion thrilled,

  Who my spirit with doubt has filled?...

  Goal before me there is none,

  My heart is hollow, vain my mind

  And with sadness wearies me

  Noisy life’s monotony.

  1828.

  CONSOLATION

  LIFE, — does it disappoint thee?

  Grieve not, nor be angry thou!

  In days of sorrow gentle be:

  Come shall, believe, the joyful day.

  In the future lives the heart:

  Is the present sad indeed?

  ‘T is but a moment, all will pass;

  Once in the past, it shall be dear.

  1825.

  FRIENDSHIP

  THUS it ever was and ever will be,

  Such of old is the world wide:

  The learned are many, the sages few,

  Acquaintance many, but not a friend!

  FAME

  BLESSED who to himself has kept

  His creation highest of the soul,

  And from his fellows as from the graves

  Expected not appreciation!

  Blessed he who in silence sang

  And the crown of fame not wearing,

  By mob despised and forgotten,

  Forsaken nameless has the world!

  Deceiver greater than dreams of hope,

  What is fame? The adorer’s whisper?

  Or the boor’s persecution?

  Or the rapture of the fool?

  AT the gates of Eden a tender angel

  With drooping head was shining;

  A demon gloomy and rebellious

  Over hell’s abyss was flying.

  The Spirit of Denial, the Spirit of Doubt

  The Spirit of Purity espied;

  And a tender warmth unwittingly

  Now first to know it learned he.

  Adieu, he spake, thee I saw:

  Not in vain hast thou shone before me;

  Not all in the world have I hated,

  Not all in the world have I scorned.

  1827.

  HOME-SICKNESS

  MAYHAP not long am destined I

  In exile peaceful to remain,

  Of dear days of yore to sigh,

  And rustic muse in quiet

  With spirit calm to follow.

  But even far, in foreign land,

  In thought forever roam I shall

  Around Trimountain mine:

  By meadows, river, by its hills,

  By garden, linden nigh the house.

  Thus when darkens day the clear,

  Alone from depths of grave,

  Spirit home-longing

  Into the native hall flies

  To espy the loved ones with tender glance.

  1825.

  INSANITY

  GOD gran
t I grow not insane:

  No, better the stick and beggar’s bag;

  No, better toil and hunger bear.

  Not that I upon my reason

  Such value place; not that I

  Would fain not lose it.

  If freedom to me they would leave

  How I would lasciviously

  For the gloomy forest rush!

  In hot delirium I would sing

  And unconscious would remain

  With ravings wondrous and chaotic.

  And listen would I to the waves

  And gaze I would full of bliss

  Into the empty heavens.

  And free and strong then would I be

  Like a storm the fields updigging,

  Forest-trees uprooting.

  But here’s the trouble: if crazy once,

  A fright thou art like pestilence,

  And locked up now shalt thou be.

  To a chain thee, fool, they’ll fasten

  And through the gate, a circus beast,

  Thee to nettle the people come.

  And at night not hear shall I

  Clear the voice of nightingale

  Nor the forest’s hollow sound,

  But cries alone of companions mine

  And the scolding guards of night

  And a whizzing, of chains a ringing.

  1833

  DEATH-THOUGHTS

  WHETHER I roam along the noisy streets

  Whether I enter the peopled temple,

  Whether I sit by thoughtless youth,

  Haunt my thoughts me everywhere.

  I — say, Swiftly go the years by:

  However great our number now,

  Must all descend the eternal vaults, —

  Already struck has some one’s hour.

  And if I gaze upon the lonely oak

  I — think: the patriarch of the woods

  Will survive my passing age

  As he survived my father’s age.

  And if a tender babe I fondle

  Already I mutter, Fare thee well!

  I — yield my place to thee. For me

  ‘T is time to decay, to bloom for thee

  Every year thus, every day

  With death my thought I join

  Of coming death the day

  I seek among them to divine.

  Where will Fortune send me death?

  In battle? In wanderings, or on the waves?

  Or shall the valley neighboring

  Receive my chilled dust?

  But tho’ the unfeeling body

  Can everywhere alike decay,

  Still I, my birthland nigh

  Would have my body lie.

  Let near the entrance to my grave

  Cheerful youth be in play engaged,

  And let indifferent creation

  With beauty shine there eternally.

  1829.

  RIGHTS

  NOT dear I prize high-sounding rights

  By which is turned more head than one;

  Not murmur I that not granted the Gods to me

  The blessed lot of discussing fates,

  Of hindering kings from fighting one another;

  And little care I whether free the press is.

  All this you see are words, words, words

  Other, better rights, dear to me are;

  Other, better freedom is my need....

  To depend on rulers, or the mob —

  Is not all the same it? God be with them!

  To give account to none; to thyself alone

  To serve and please; for power, for a livery

  Nor soul, nor mind, nor neck to bend:

  Now here, now there to roam in freedom

  Nature’s beauties divine admiring,

  And before creations of art and inspiration

  Melt silently in tender ecstasy —

  This is bliss, these are rights!...

  THE GYPSIES

  OVER the wooded banks,

  In the hour of evening quiet,

  Under the tents are song and bustle

  And the fires are scattered.

  Thee I greet, O happy race!

  I recognize thy blazes,

  I — myself at other times

  These tents would have followed.

  With the early rays to-morrow

  Shall disappear your freedom’s trace,

  Go you will — but not with you

  Longer go shall the bard of you.

  He alas, the changing lodgings,

  And the pranks of days of yore

  Has forgot for rural comforts

  And for the quiet of a home.

  THE DELIBASH

  CROSS-FIRING behind the hills:

  Both camps watch, theirs and ours;

  In front of Cossaks on the hill

  Dashes ‘long brave Delibash

  O Delibash, not to the line come nigh,

  Do have mercy on thy life;

  Quick ‘t is over with thy frolic bold,

  Pierced thou by the spear shalt be

  Hey, Cossak, not to battle rush

  The Delibash is swift as wind;

  Cut he will with crooked sabre

  From thy shoulders thy fearless head.

  They rush with yell: are hand to hand;

  And behold now what each befalls:

  Already speared the Delibash is

  Already headless the Cossak is!

  HYMN TO FORCE

  I am eternal!

  I throb through the ages;

  I am the Master

  Of each of Life’s stages.

  I quicken the blood

  Of the mate-craving lover;

  The age-frozen heart

  With daisies I cover.

  Down through the ether

  I hurl constellations;

  Up from their earth-bed

  I wake the carnations.

  I laugh in the flame

  As I kindle and fan it;

  I crawl in the worm;

  I leap in the planet.

  Forth from its cradle

  I pilot the river;

  In lightning and earthquake

  I flash and I quiver.

  My breath is the wind;

  My bosom the ocean;

  My form’s undefined;

  My essence is motion.

  The braggarts of science

  Would weigh and divide me;

  Their wisdom evading,

  I vanish and hide me.

  My glances are rays

  From stars emanating;

  My voice through the spheres

  Is sound, undulating.

  I am the monarch

  Uniting all matter:

  The atoms I gather;

  The atoms I scatter.

  I pulse with the tides —

  Now hither, now thither;

  I grant the tree sap;

  I bid the bud wither.

  I always am present,

  Yet nothing can bind me;

  Like thought evanescent,

  They lose me who find me.

  THE BLACK SHAWL

  I gaze demented on the black shawl,

  And my cold soul is torn by grief.

  When young I was and full of trust

  I passionately loved a young Greek girl.

  The charming maid, she fondled me,

  But soon I lived the black day to see.

  Once as were gathered my jolly guests,

  A detested Jew knocked at my door.

  Thou art feasting, he whispered, with friends,

  But betrayed thou art by thy Greek maid.

  Moneys I gave him and curses,

  And called my servant, the faithful.

  We went; I flew on the wings of my steed,

  And tender mercy was silent in me.

  Her threshold no sooner I espied,

  Dark grew my eyes, and my strength departed.

  The distant chamber I enter alone —

  An Armenian embraces
my faithless maid.

  Darkness around me: flashed the dagger;

  To interrupt his kiss the wretch had no time.

  And long I trampled the headless corpse, —

  And silent and pale at the maid I stared.

  I remember her prayers, her flowing blood,

  But perished the girl, and with her my love.

  The shawl I took from the head now dead,

  And wiped in silence the bleeding steel.

  When came the darkness of eve, my serf

  Threw their bodies into the billows of the Danube.

  Since then I kiss no charming eyes,

  Since then I know no cheerful days.

  I gaze demented on the black shawl,

  And my cold soul is torn by grief.

  THE OUTCAST

  On a rainy autumn evening

  Into desert places went a maid;

  And the secret fruit of unhappy love

  In her trembling hands she held.

  All was still: the woods and the hills

  Asleep in the darkness of the night;

  And her searching glances

  In terror about she cast.

  And on this babe, the innocent,

  Her glance she paused with a sigh:

  “Asleep thou art, my child, my grief,

  Thou knowest not my sadness.

  Thine eyes will ope, and though with longing,

  To my breast shalt no more cling.

  No kiss for thee to-morrow

  From thine unhappy mother.

  Beckon in vain for her thou wilt,

  My everlasting shame, my guilt!

  Me forget thou shalt for aye,

  But thee forget shall not I;

  Shelter thou shalt receive from strangers;

  Who’ll say: Thou art none of ours!

  Thou wilt ask: Where are my parents?

  But for thee no kin is found.

  Hapless one! with heart filled with sorrow,

  Lonely amid thy mates,

  Thy spirit sullen to the end

  Thou shalt behold the fondling mothers.

  A lonely wanderer everywhere,

  Cursing thy fate at all times,

  Thou the bitter reproach shalt hear …

  Forgive me, oh, forgive me then!

  Asleep! let me then, O hapless one,

  To my bosom press thee once for all;

  A law unjust and terrible

  Thee and me to sorrow dooms.

  While the years have not yet chased

  The guiltless joy of thy days,

  Sleep, my darling; let no bitter griefs

  Mar thy childhood’s quiet life!”

  But lo, behind the woods, near by,