Ирландский поэтарх

That thing all blood and mire, that beast-torn wreck,

Half turned and fixed a glazing eye on mine,

And, though love’s bitter-sweet had all come back,

Those bodies from a picture or a coin

Nor saw my body fall nor heard it shriek,

Nor knew, drunken with singing as with wine,

That they had brought no fabulous symbol there

But my heart’s victim and its torturer.

IX. A LAST CONFESSION

WHAT lively lad most pleasured me

Of all that with me lay?

I answer that I gave my soul

And loved in misery,

But had great pleasure with a lad

That I loved bodily.

Flinging from his arms I laughed

To think his passion such

He fancied that I gave a soul

Did but our bodies touch,

And laughed upon his breast to think

Beast gave beast as much.

I gave what other women gave

«That stepped out of their clothes.

But when this soul, its body off,

Naked to naked goes,

He it has found shall find therein

What none other knows,

And give his own and take his own

And rule in his own right;

And though it loved in misery

Close and cling so tight,

There’s not a bird of day that dare

Extinguish that delight.

X. MEETING

HIDDEN by old age awhile

In masker’s cloak and hood,

Each hating what the other loved,

Face to face we stood:

«That I have met with such,» said he,

«Bodes me little good.»

«Let others boast their fill,» said I,

«But never dare to boast

That such as I had such a man

For lover in the past;

Say that of living men I hate

Such a man the most.

«A loony’d boast of such a love,»

He in his rage declared:

But such as he for such as me —

Could we both discard

This beggarly habiliment —

Had found a sweeter word.

XI. FROM THE «ANTIGONE»

OVERCOME – O bitter sweetness,

Inhabitant of the soft cheek of a girl —

The rich man and his affairs,

The fat flocks and the fields’ fatness,

Mariners, rough harvesters;

Overcome Gods upon Parnassus;

Overcome the Empyrean; hurl

Heaven and Earth out of their places,

That in the Same calamity

Brother and brother, friend and friend,

Family and family,

City and city may contend,

By that great glory driven wild.

Pray I will and sing I must,

And yet I weep – Oedipus’ child

Descends into the loveless dust.

Женщина молодая и пожилая

I. ОТЕЦ И РЕБЕНОК

Она слышит шум, как мы говорим,

что под запретом находится она.