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CHRISTMAS BALLAD |
For Evgeny Rein, with love |
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There floats in an abiding gloom, |
among immensities of brick, |
a little boat of night: it seems |
to sail through Alexander Park. |
It's just a lonely streetlamp, though, |
a yellow rose against the night, |
for lovers strolling down below |
the busy street. |
|
There floats in an abiding gloom |
a drone of bees: men drunk, asleep. |
In the dark capital a lone |
tourist takes another snap. |
Now out onto Ordynka turns |
a taxicab, with sickly faces; |
dead men lean into the arms |
of the low houses. |
|
There floats in an abiding gloom |
a poet in sorrow; over here |
a round-faced man sells kerosene, |
the sad custodian of his store. |
Along a dull deserted street |
an old Lothario hurries. Soon |
the midnight-riding newlyweds |
sail through the gloom. |
|
There floats in outer Moscow one |
who swims at random to his loss, |
and Jewish accents wander down |
a dismal yellow flight of stairs. |
From love toward unhappiness, |
to New Year's Eve, to Sunday, floats |
a good-time girl: she can't express |
what's lost inside. |
|
Cold evening floats within your eyes |
and snow is fluttering on the panes |
of carriages; the wind is ice |
and pale, it seals your reddened palms. |
Evening lights like honey seep; |
the scent of halvah's everywhere, |
as Christmas Eve lifts up its sweet |
meats in the air. |
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Now drifting on a dark-blue wave |
across the city's gloomy sea, |
there floating by, your New Year's Eve-- |
as if life could restart, could be |
a thing of light with each day lived |
successfully, and food to eat, |
--as if, life having rolled to left, |
it could roll right. |
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|
Joseph Brodsky |
(translated by Glyn Maxwell) |