A poem by Alexander Pushkin – Pouchkine, Pooshkin (1799-1837), in English translation
Storm-clouds hurtle, storm-clouds hover;
Flying snow is set alight
By the moon whose form they cover;
Blurred the heavens, blurred the night.
On and on our coach advances,
Little bell goes din-din-din…
Round are vast, unknown expanses;
Terror, terror is within.
— Faster, coachman! “Can’t, sir, sorry:
Horses, sir, are nearly dead.
I am blinded, all is blurry,
All snowed up; can’t see ahead.
Sir, I tell you on the level:
We have strayed, we’ve lost the trail.
What can WE do, when a devil
Drives us, whirls us round the vale?
“There, look, there he’s playing, jolly!
Huffing, puffing in my course;
There, you see, into the gully
Pushing the hysteric horse;
Now in front of me his figure
Looms up as a queer mile-mark —
Coming closer, growing bigger,
Sparking, melting in the dark.”
Storm-clouds hurtle, storm-clouds hover;
Flying snow is set alight
By the moon whose form they cover;
Blurred the heavens, blurred the night.
We can’t whirl so any longer!
Suddenly, the bell has ceased,
Horses halted… — Hey, what’s wrong there?
“Who can tell! — a stump? a beast?..”
Blizzard’s raging, blizzard’s crying,
Horses panting, seized by fear;
Far away his shape is flying;
Still in haze the eyeballs glare;
Horses pull us back in motion,
Little bell goes din-din-din…
I behold a strange commotion:
Evil spirits gather in —
Sundry, ugly devils, whirling
In the moonlight’s milky haze:
Swaying, flittering and swirling
Like the leaves in autumn days…
What a crowd! Where are they carried?
What’s the plaintive song I hear?
Is a goblin being buried,
Or a sorceress married there?
Storm-clouds hurtle, storm-clouds hover;
Flying snow is set alight
By the moon whose form they cover;
Blurred the heavens, blurred the night.
Swarms of devils come to rally,
Hurtle in the boundless height;
Howling fills the whitening valley,
Plaintive screeching rends my heart…
translated by: Genia Gurarie
email: egurarie@princeton.edu
Copyright ©:
Genia Gurarie
A few random poems:
- The Jester by Rudyard Kipling
- Constantias Song
- The Doctor Will Return by Weldon Kees
- IX: Some Verses: This Day Design’d To Spoil The World of Peace by William Alexander
- Ольга Ермолаева – Герасим Грачевник
- Ghazal 314 by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- The Connaught Rangers by Winifred Mary Letts
- Михаил Лермонтов – Забудь опять свои надежды
- Николай Заболоцкий – В этой роще березовой
- There is a Way by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- A Character by William Wordsworth
- Владимир Бенедиктов – Недоверчивость
- PLEADING by Satish Verma
- Love Of Life poem – Alfred Austin
- Vietnam Vet befriends an immigrant in Pittsburgh, Pa – ( let’s put it that way ) by Vasil Slavov
External links
Bat’s Poetry Page – more poetry by Fledermaus
Talking Writing Monster’s Page –
Batty Writing – the bat’s idle chatter, thoughts, ideas and observations, all original, all fresh
Poems in English
- Юрий Галансков – Мне больно
- Юрий Галансков – Человеческий манифест
- Юрий Галансков стихи: читать все стихотворения, поэмы поэта Юрий Галансков – Поэзия на Poetry Monster
- Юрий Энтин – Слово про слово
- Юрий Левитанский – Не брести мне сушею
- Юрий Левитанский – Мое поколение
- Юрий Левитанский – Кто-то так уже писал
- Юрий Левитанский – Кинематограф
- Юрий Левитанский – Как зарок от суесловья, как залог
- Юрий Левитанский – Иронический человек
- Юрий Левитанский – Грач над березовой чащей
- Юрий Левитанский – Диалог у новогодней елки
- Юрий Левитанский – Что я знаю про стороны света
- Юрий Левитанский – Человек, строящий воздушные замки
- Юрий Левитанский – Белый снег
- Юрий Верховский – Зачем, паук, уходишь торопливо
- Юрий Верховский – Вариации на тему Пушкина
- Юрий Верховский – В майское утро
- Юрий Верховский – Судьба с судьбой
- Юрий Верховский – Рождественскою ночью
More external links (open in a new tab):
Doska or the Board – write anything
Search engines:
Yandex – the best search engine for searches in Russian (and the best overall image search engine, in any language, anywhere)
Qwant – the best search engine for searches in French, German as well as Romance and Germanic languages.
Ecosia – a search engine that supposedly… plants trees
Duckduckgo – the real alternative and a search engine that actually works. Without much censorship or partisan politics.
Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.
Parallel Translations of Poetry
The Poetry Repository – an online library of poems, poetry, verse and poetic works
Alexander Pushkin (1799-1937) was a Russian poet, playwright and prose writer, founder of the realistic trend in Russian literature, literary critic and theorist of literature, historian, publicist, journalist; one of the most important cultural figures in Russia in the first third of the 19th century.