Fedor Tyutchev

Columbus, take your laurel wreath!
You've done the map of whole Earth and Nations
And finished to the end the list
Of deals, unfinished in the word's creation.  

You cut the curtain off with your majestic sword --
And a new world, the sudden one and nameless, 
From space, mysterious and  endless,                                 
Was brought by you into the light of God.

Thus, for the ages, they are bound 
By sacred bonds of kinship's blood --  
The humane genius, that astounds,  
And animated nature flood.

If he says just a word, that's saintly, 
The nature, with a great new world,
Would send its answer -- always gladly --
To this immortal, sacred word.


Translated by Yevgeny Bonver, October 2000