translated from the Russian by Marina Pavlova

2

My soul is fed up to the throat
With wrongs and fiendish hurt,
I swear to give up the revolt
Against the Demon’s hordes—

Not as they were in books of old—
Fiery cataracts—
Against the everyday assaults
Of people’s callousness—

I come to you, my forest trees—
Escape from market roars!
By following your skyward sweeps
My heart turns rapturous!

An oak in God-defying battle,
All root and foliage!
Willows, clairvoyant, heaving sighs,
And birches, virginal!

An elm—enraged Abishalom,
Strappadoed bristliness
Of pines—and you, my fervid psalm—
My rowan bitterness . . .

To you, into quicksilver clouds—
Falling and scattering!
So I can finally stretch my arms
Without the manuscripts!

My hands receive the splashing green—
In lively cadences . . .
My bareheaded, humble trees,
My ever-tremulous . . .

1922

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