A poem by Alexander Block – Alexandre Block – Alexandr Blok – Александр Блок
(1880-1921)
III
Our sons have gone
to serve the Reds
to serve the Reds
to risk their heads!
O bitter,bitter pain,
Sweet living!
A torn overcoat
an Austrian gun!
-To get the bourgeosie
We’ll start a fire
a worldwide fire, and drench it
in blood-
The good Lord bless us!
-O you bitter bitterness,
boring boredom,
deadly boredom.
This is how I will
spend my time.
This is how I will
scratch my head,
munch on seeds,
some sunflower seeds,
play with my knife
play with my knife.
You bourgeosie, fly as a sparrow!
I’ll drink your blood,
your warm blood, for love,
for dark-eyed love.
God, let this soul, your servant,
rest in peace.
Such boredom!
XII
… On they march with sovereign tread…
‘Who else goes there? Come out! I said
come out!’ It is the wind and the red
flag plunging gaily at their head.
The frozen snow-drift looms in front.
‘Who’s in the drift! Come out! Come here!’
There’s only the homeless mongrel runt
limping wretchedly in the rear …
‘You mangy beast, out of the way
before you taste my bayonet.
Old mongrel world, clear off I say!
I’ll have your hide to sole my boot!
The shivering cur, the mongrel cur
bares his teeth like a hungry wolf,
droops his tail, but does not stir …
‘Hey answer, you there, show yourself.’
‘Who’s that waving the red flag?’
‘Try and see! It’s as dark as the tomb!’
‘Who’s that moving at a jog
trot, keeping to the back-street gloom?’
‘Don’t you worry ~ I’ll catch you yet;
better surrender to me alive!’
‘Come out, comrade, or you’ll regret
it ~ we’ll fire when I’ve counted five!’
Crack ~ crack ~ crack! But only the echo
answers from among the eaves …
The blizzard splits his seams, the snow
laughs wildly up the wirlwind’s sleeve …
Crack ~ crack ~ crack!
Crack ~ crack ~ crack!
… So they march with sovereign tread …
Behind them limps the hungry dog,
and wrapped in wild snow at their head
carrying a blood-red flag ~
soft-footed where the blizzard swirls,
invulnerable where bullets crossed ~
crowned with a crown of snowflake pearls,
a flowery diadem of frost,
ahead of them goes Jesus Christ.
A few random poems:
- Владимир Маяковский – За четыре года советской власти… (Главполитпросвет №248)
- Be Lost In The Call by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Robert Burns: To Gavin Hamilton, Esq., Mauchline,: Recommending a Boy.
- Nube by Manolo Arriola
- Владимир Костров – Просыпаюсь от сердечной боли
- Юлия Друнина – Бежала от морозов, вот беда
- Владимир Маяковский – Рабочей России Красной рыцарь…
- Prairie-Grass Dividing, The. by Walt Whitman
- Sonnet 85: My tongue-tied Muse in manners holds her still by William Shakespeare
- Cut Grass by Philip Larkin
- I See Your Beauty by Ronald G. Auguste
- Under Cover of Night by Robert Desnos
- The Gardener XIX: You Walked by Rabindranath Tagore
- America by Tony Hoagland
- Владимир Маяковский – Важнейший совет домашней хозяйке
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
- Низами Гянджеви – Жить в заботе и невзгодах, расточая зло
- Низами Гянджеви – Я долго шел по лугу лет
- Низами Гянджеви – Я бросил молодость в пожар моей любви
- Низами Гянджеви – Хмельное счастье мое очнется
- Низами Гянджеви – Встань, виночерпий, не ленись
- Низами Гянджеви – Влюбленных порицают все
- Низами Гянджеви – В привычке сердца воровать ты
- Низами Гянджеви – В ночи я знаю
- Низами Гянджеви – Увы, на этой лужайке, где согнут страстью я,
- Низами Гянджеви – Ты видишь: я твой давний друг
- Низами Гянджеви – Ты рукой мне сжала сердце
- Низами Гянджеви – Тропы мне ни в духан, ни к богу нету
- Низами Гянджеви – Там, где лик ты светлый явишь
- Низами Гянджеви – Спустилась ночь
- Низами Гянджеви – Спать не стоит
- Низами Гянджеви – Слышишь, звякнул бубенцами
- Низами Гянджеви – Семь красавиц
- Низами Гянджеви – Розу пологом колючим
- Низами Гянджеви – Расступился черный мускус
- Низами Гянджеви – Ради встречи с тобой я до края земли дошел
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 Blok (1880-1921), also Block, was a Russian poet, writer, publicist, playwright, translator and literary critic. A classic of Russian literature.