Translation of Poem by GEORGY IVANOV, "In any polemic with inhuman fate," "С безчеловечною судьбой"

Georgy Ivanov, 1921

                                Poem and Literal Translation from The Penguin Book of Russian Verse
                                                            (Edited by Dimitri Obolensky)


                                                        


                                                   Literary Translation/Adaptation by U.R. Bowie

In any polemic with inhuman fate

You prattle in vain, you needlessly prate,

For all is mirage and delusion.

But this evening

Where azurest blues undulate

Is all mine,

And in no way illusion.

And the sky. Through the twigs it shows red,

While its edges are fine-tinged in pearl . . .

Throughout lilacs the trills of the nightingale spread,

While an ant trudges on into dreamland ahead,

So someone must need all this bustle and swirl.

Could be someone needs even the breaths of fresh air

That I ceaselessly take down my throat,

Or the glimmer is useful to some doctrinaire,

That smidgen of sunset on left sleeve of coat,

While a right sleeve is drowning in starlight’s bright glare.  

Georgy Ivanov

(1894-1958)