Mikhail Lvov

I’m now by the immense distance
Deprived from any peaceful life,
And don’t remember in this instant
Columns of theaters and lights,
And swans high suffering and fear,
And woe of the gentle swans…
I hear only crying here
And see just goose-foot in the plains.
And I remember art in whole 
As the obscure, distant past:
Just as first love of youthful soul,
Forever gone, forever cast…
And with our teeth, tighted to groan,
Stride forward through the dust and mud –
As if no art were ever known,
But only iron, bread and blood.


Translated by Yevgeny Bonver, August, 2001