An Excerpt by Joseph A. Brodsky
The English Poetic Rendition by Anna A. Polibina-Polansky
A Polar Explorer
All dogs are eaten up. So the diary keeps
Not a single white page. The beads of words
Covers up a picture of his wife. Her cheeks
Keep moles of dates. So the snapshot hurts.
Further follows a picture of his younger sister.
He takes no pity at her, the latitude and the width
Of joy, contain a meaningful answer.
So the rotten black leg quits its aching existence.
The thigh reminds ...
* * * * *
Polonez: a Variation. To Z.K.
1
In your semisphere the fall season cries like a bird of prey.
Beggars loose their warm quilt and mantle.
Windows are ajar, angles go astray.
So the center of the circle is the most concealed, at the metal.
Of domes. So you give out yourself, with a feater swift and a lamp.
You can't fix the nose of Frederic there at the covers of pianos.
So the cropfield of someone's fund at the midnight, is damp.
What is there, only the sha...
By Joseph A. Brodsky
The English Versified Translation, by Anna A. Polibina-Polansky
Pilgrims' Progress
By sanctuaries, coliseums,
Beside the temples, bars, bazaars.
By minarets and rare museums;
By the sepultures lightly seeming,
By squares with palaces of Tsars.
By woe and by boons of heaven,
By Mecca and Medina, Rome...
Blue luminaries ever happen
To burn their heads, to shine at domes.
They walk along, all crooked and hungry,
In shaggy cloth. Their eyes are all
Of twi...
By Joseph A. Brodsky
The English Poetic Renditions by Anna A. Polibina-Polansky
*** Almost an Elegy
In those days I spent a chilly rain
Downside the Borsa's columns, by their row.
I though it was all granted and I praised
The Lord. To sheer truth, I was yet prone.
I was so bold, just to face up the bad.
And I was happy at the yoke of angels.
Like Jacob, I did wait for steps ahead
Of me. The beauty followed, half-dimantled.
I look in windows; "where" is all up torn.
Sign...
By Joseph A. Brodsky
The English Poetic Rendition, by Anna A. Polibina-Polansky
The Land of Lakes
Of thrifty dentists, was the country, so.
Its daughters signed their garments, out of London.
Their claws bore their banner, and their soul
Was of the Tooth of Wisdom. So I pondered.
Their mouth of cavities, I blankly spied,
About the rotten, lost civilization.
The teacher of bleak eloquence applied
For having guts and veins. Of accusations,
The college was nearby the Basic Lake....
