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Lyrics translations

The Cross
All lyrics by Nikolai Gumilev

The Cross

translated by: B. Raffel & A. Burago
source: Selected Works of Nikolai S. Gumilev, 1972

Card after card lied to me, lied and lied,
and even wine no longer helped.
Cold March stars hung pale,
anxious, outside the window.

Coldly mad, in a crazy passion,
I felt the game was a dream.
"I bet everything in the bank, all of it!" I shouted.
And I lost.

I left. Dawn shadows
moved gently, lovingly over the delicate snow.
I can't remember how, but I fell
on my knees, my gold cross pressed to my lips:

"Oh to be free, to be pure, like the sky, like the stars,
to accept your staff, oh Sister Poverty,
to wander, to beg my bread,
commanding men's souls with this sacred cross!"

Another moment—and then everyone in that noisy,
laughing hall shrank back, frightened,
as I stalked insanely through the room
and bet my cross on the next card.

Lakes

translated by: Richard McKane
source: N.Gumilev. 1999. The pillar of fire and selected poems

I smashed happiness with sacrilegious triumph,
     and there is no anguish, no reproach,
but every night I dream so clearly
     of vast night lakes.
The lilies on the mourning black waves
     are silent as my thoughts,
and the silver-white willows
     arouse forgotten, sad spells.
The moon illumines the bends of the road
     and sees the deserted field,
how I choke in the heavy alarm,
     and wring my hands till they hurt.
I will remember and something must appear,
     like the denouement in a twilight drama:
the sad girl, the white bird
     or a strange, tender fable.
And a new sun will sparkle in the mist
     and the shadows will be dragonflies,
and the proud swans of ancient tales
     will come out on the white steps.
But I can't remember. I am weak, wingless,
     I look at the night lakes
and hear how the waves babble weakly
     the words of the fateful reproach.
I will wake up, my lips confident as before.
     The night is distant and alien,
and the minutes of labour and peace
     are both earthly, beautiful and vulgar.

Portrait of a Man

translated by: Brighid Rhaynn
source: www.gumilev.ru

His eyes are lightless underground lakes,
Abandoned castles of the ancient kings.
Marked with the sign of the eternal shame
Of that, the Other One, he never speaks.

The deepest wound, his mouth, dark and purple,
Made with a blade borne of the deadly poison;
And it is sad and grimly shut so early,
It's calling you to pleasures strange and poignant.

His hands are like the moonlight marble pallid,
All horrors of damnation in them shown.
They have caressed those girls who were called fairies
And bloody crucifixes they have known.

The strangest ever fate he's got in time
To be the dream of murderers and poets.
When he was born, in the forbidding sky
Appeared and dissolved a bloody comet.

Deep in his soul is pain of the unfair,
Deep in his soul are sorrows with no names;
And for all gardens of sweet Virgin Mary
His precious memories he won't exchange.

He's angry but blasphemous he is not.
The colour of his silky skin is tender.
He smiles so nice and he would laugh a lot,
But crying... crying's lost to him for ever.

Abandoned God

translated by: Ailatan Anili

Sometimes I am feeling sad,
I am god – abandoned, forgotten,
Who is building back out of ruins
The old churches with doors to the future.

It is hard to create a new temple
Out of ash, and the faithless would say
That the Dream, the Eternal and Holy,
Have burned out and people went blind.

And then somebody’s voice from above,
From somewhere beyond the blue sky,
Started talking to me with passion
Telling me of the global battle.

“My brother, though tired and pale,
Don’t give up, sacrifice your whole self,
If you want that the mountain peaks
Would shine in the darkness of night.

If you want to unfold the horizon
In front of the poor and sick
Take the days of stinging sadness
Away into your powerful heart.

Be a pure sacrifice at sunrise,
Speechless burn in the darkest abyss,
And you’ll be the Promised Star
Announcing the coming of dawn.”

Eagle

translated by: Richard McKane
source: N.Gumilev. 1999. The pillar of fire and selected poems

The eagle flew ever more high and on
to the Almighty's Throne through the stars' thresholds
and his regal flight was beautiful,
his brown feathers were glossy.

Where had he lived before? Perhaps imprisoned
in the shackles of the royal menagerie,
he had screamed, meeting the spring girl
in love with the thoughtful prince.

Or perhaps in a sorcerer's lair,
when he looked through a narrow window,
the heights entranced him
and powerfully transformed his heart into sun.

Isn't it all the same? The azure perfection
was revealed, playing and beckoning;
and he flew for three nights and three days
and died, choking with bliss.

Yes, he died! But he could not fall,
since he'd entered the circles of planetary motion.
The bottomless jaws yawned beneath,
but the forces of gravity were weak.

The vault of the sky was penetrated with rays,
divinely cold rays;
not knowing decay, he flew on
and looked at the stars with his dead eyes.

Worlds went on collapsing into the bottomlessness.
The trump of the archangel sounded on,
but his grand grave
was not a prey to be played with.