I have enough treasures from the pastto last me longer than I need, or want.
You know as well as I . . . malevolent memorywon't let go of half of them:a modest church, with its gold cupolaslightly askew; a harsh chorusof crows; the whistle of a train;a birch tree haggard in a fieldas if it had just been sprung from jail;a secret midnight conclaveof monumental Bible-oaks;and a tiny rowboat that comes drifting outof somebody's dreams, slowly foundering.
Winter has already loitered here,lightly powdering these fields,casting an impenetrable hazethat fills the world as far as the horizon.
I used to think that after we are gonethere's nothing, simply nothing at all.
Then who's that wandering by the porchagain and calling us by name?
Whose face is pressed against the frosted pane?
What hand out there is waving like a branch?
By way of reply, in that cobwebbed cornera sunstruck tatter dances in the mirror.
Leningrad,
Translated by Stanley Kunitz (with Max Hayward)
