Theodore Roethke

Я знал фемину дивно тонкую в кости,
Она на птичьи песни подпевать могла;
И так могла многозначительно идти:
Такую стать, изыск природа ей дала!…

1In a shoe box stuffed in an old nylon stocking
Sleeps the baby mouse I found in the meadow,
Where he trembled and shook beneath a stick
Till I caught him up by the tail and brought him in,…

В ящике для обуви, вжавшись в старый носок,
Спит младенец мышиный, найденный в поле,
Где дрожал под какой-то былинкой,
Пока не взял его за хвостик и не принес домой…

Nothing would sleep in that cellar, dank as a ditch,
Bulbs broke out of boxes hunting for chinks in the dark,
Shoots dangled and drooped,
Lolling obscenely from mildewed crates,…

This urge, wrestle, resurrection of dry sticks,
Cut stems struggling to put down feet,
What saint strained so much,
Rose on such lopped limbs to a new life?…

In Saginaw, in Saginaw,
The wind blows up your feet,
When the ladies’ guild puts on a feed,
There’s beans on every plate,…

1What’s this? A dish for fat lips.
Who says? A nameless stranger.
Is he a bird or a tree? Not everyone can tell.Water recedes to the crying of spiders.
An old scow bumps over black rocks.…

In the long journey out of the self,
There are many detours, washed-out interrupted raw places
Where the shale slides dangerously
And the back wheels hang almost over the edge…

The whiskey on your breath
Could make a small boy dizzy;
But I hung on like death:
Such waltzing was not easy.