Tiếng Anh

Thank Thee, O Lord, for Thy grace,
That with time we forget any woe.
But what troubles me doesn’t melt
As if it’s the eternal snow.

It doesn’t melt even in summer
In the mid-day heat,
And I do know that this trouble
Forever will be with me.

I was into women and flirtation
And each day had more than my fair share;
There were scores of tales in circulation all around me
All about my personal affairs.

And one day by chance along the highway
By the sea - where dangers can be rife -
I met one of many who came my way
On the rocky road that was my life.

There was not a girl who’s heart was bigger,
With so free and generous a soul,
And she’d got a lovely, curvy figure -
While as for me, I’d pockets full of holes.

But she needed rings and things as presents,
Brand-new perfumes, restaurants each night;
In return she’d give you something pleasant
From her range of dubious delights.

She said: "Come on, Vasya, let’s canoodle -
Take my precious body on a plate."
I said: "Okay, for a hundred roubles -
Or for more, I’ll bring along a mate."

Ah, but women without careful handling
Champ the bit and rear like angry steeds.
It was maybe my misunderstanding,
For she took offence and took her leave.

In a month my worries proved unfounded;
In a month she once more came to call.
I would say, there’s no two ways around it,
That the price had pleased her after all.

I love you here and now,
not secretly - for show;
I’m burning in your rays - neither before nor after.
I do not want the past, the future I don’t know.
I love you here and now, with tears and with laughter.

"I loved you" is so sad,
it’s colder than the dead,
All tenderness in me it will hamstring and kill, -
Although it was the poet of poets who said,
"I loved you once: that love, perhaps, is still..."1

They speak thus of the faded and the lost,
There’s pity here, a touch of condescension,
As for a king long from the throne removed.
There is a mild regret here for the past,
A longing slightly marred by apprehension,
A sort of faint distrust towards "I love."

I love you here and now,
without a stain or loss.
This is my day and age - I shall not slash my veins!
At present, during, now and in the course -
The future leaves me cold, the past won’t come again.

I’ll swim or wade or crawl
to you - then come what may!
Lugging my fetters and a heavy yoke.
Cut off my head, but never make me say
"I shall" after "I love", please, not even in joke.

About "I shall" there’s bitterness, alas,
It’s like a forgery, or some such disgrace,
A hatch to use when it suits you to go,
Clear poison at the bottom of the glass;
A slap in honest present tense’s face,
A twinge of doubt about "I love you" now.

My French dream makes no sense,
I struggle with each tense,
The future is all wrong, and in the past I stammer.
I’m pilloried, it seems, in every sense.
I’m locked behind the barrier of grammar.

This barrier, I guess,
is worse than any fence.
But we shall seek and find a way from this impasse.
I love you, dear, in every blessed tense -
Even the future, and the compound past!

She was so beautiful, so stately and so grand,
And cleaner than the freshly fallen snow...
Alas! Today her letter burns my hand,
From it a bitter truth I’ve come to know!

If she was true - I didn’t ever ask her,
I see her love was just the mask she wore...
This time I’m facing a complete fiasco,
I’ll never let it happen any more!

“My days are numbered!” - to myself I said,
Her infidelity is torturous and ripping;
I squeezed the letter as a viper’s head -
And from that page black venom started dripping!

I run from pain, distress and devastation,
The wind will wipe my tears if I weep;
My horse is flying faster than frustration,
My hasty tracks the blizzard won’t sweep!

The pallid sky above me sadly shrinks,
I rid myself of tokens of woe -
Of dazing daisies, whithered naked pinks,
And tears, mingled with the melting snow!

Don’t cry - for your misfortunes no one cares,
I won’t take anything, yet nothing will I give!
I rush on forward, seeking new affairs,
In which I’ll win, or else why should I live?

In the beginning was the word...

The Word in the beginning had struck the vital spark -
The Earth was born in tortures, quakes and torsion;
Enormous pieces broke off the mainland in the dark
Becoming later islands in the ocean.

And floating around with no freight or skipper
Through centuries and ages, which, like a serpent, crept,
The island changed its visage, a vagabond and tripper,
But still the mainland Spirit it wonderfully kept.

The Word of the beginning was soon replaced with deeds,
And sailors then inhabited the planet,
They rushed aboard those islands, and rigged them for their needs
And called them “ships” because this name was splendid.

But Land attracts the islands with that perpetual straining
Which drags the islands home - they will be back, of course,
Although on the islands sea rules are always reigning,
They keep the earthly honor and continental laws.

My theory is novel, in science quite unheard,
It’s rather brave and free of any caution -
If on the Earth in the beginning there was the Word,
This word, without doubt, was “the ocean”!

Many years mighty Troy was under siege
And remained an unconquerable fort.
If the Trojans harked Cassandra’s speech
Maybe Troy would still be holding court.

With eyes delirious, the maiden
Kept on saying, "I see my Troy in ashes and alight!"
But prophets, like the witnesses all ended
On stakes. And always burned with equal light.

That day from Horse’s belly death descended.
It was a wingED one as lore dictates.
In murder’s bloody reign neverending,
They yelled, "This witch must perish at the stake!"

With eyes delirious, the maiden
Kept on saying, "I see my Troy in ashes and alight!"
But prophets, like the witnesses all ended
On stakes. And always burned with equal light.

That night, and in that chaos, that unreason
When all her prophesies played out to the letter,
The mob would find... no better season
To execute her and her fame shattered.

With eyes delirious, the maiden
Kept on saying, "I see my Troy in ashes and alight!"
But prophets, like the witnesses all ended
On stakes. And always burned with equal light.

Her end was simple, vexing, but no wonder.
Some Greek had found her remote shelter.
And started using her not as Cassandra,
But as a plain and simple subjugator.

With eyes delirious, the maiden
Kept on saying, "I see my Troy in ashes and alight!"
But prophets, like the witnesses all ended
On stakes. And always burned with equal light.

The pretty ones are dearly loved and softly
The funny ones are loved but for long
The silent ones are loved, but not as often
But if they’re loved, - then oh how strong!

Do not yell loving words, do not yell
Hold them in until time is better
Let the steamboats bugle like hell
But you - do not tell, do not tell
If you hurry - you’ll lose her forever.

She often reads about love and woe
Allow her to compare, - just try to,
Because the darker tulips grow
To make the whiter ones seem brighter.

Do not yell loving words, do not yell
Hold them in until time is better
Let the poets and rooks sing like hell
But you - do not tell, do not tell
If you hurry - you’ll lose her forever.

The words are flowing... So what then?
You’re late but there’s no regret!
Say the words, - you know that you can
If they simply cannot not be said!

Do not yell loving words, do not yell
Hold them in until time is better
Let the steamboats bugle like hell
Do not scream, do not yell, do not tell
If you hurry - you’ll lose her forever.

The moon shines in my body, but my blind eyes cannot see it:
The moon is within me, and so is the sun.
The unstruck drum of Eternity is sounded within me; but my deaf ears cannot hear it.

So long as man clamours for the I and the Mine, his works are as naught:
When all love of the I and the Mine is dead, then the work of the Lord is done.
For work has no other aim than the getting of knowledge:
When that comes, then work is put away.

The flower blooms for the fruit: when the fruit comes, the flower withers.
The musk is in the deer, but it seeks it not within itself: it wanders in quest of grass.

The river and its waves are one
surf: where is the difference between the river and its waves?
When the wave rises, it is the water; and when it falls, it is the same water again. Tell me, Sir, where is the distinction?
Because it has been named as wave, shall it no longer be considered as water?

Within the Supreme Brahma, the worlds are being told like beads:
Look upon that rosary with the eyes of wisdom.

The rich will make temples for Shiva. What shall I, a poor man, do?
My legs are pillars, The body the shrine, The head a cupola of gold.
Listen, O lord Kudal Sangama deva, Things standing shall fall, But the moving ever shall stay.