Aleksandr Pushkin

Such, as I was before, I’m now left to be:
Reckless, susceptible. My friends, you know me;
I can’t help feeling charms without strong affection
And bashful gentleness and secret agitation.
Oh, how oft through life I was deceived by love,
How oft, like a young hawk, I beat myself and strived
In the deceptive nets spread by Cyprida senseless,
And still not rectified by the offences endless,
I cry my former pleas to new idols of mine…


Translated by Yevgeny Bonver, June 26, 2003