The bronze Horseman / Медный всадник. Книга для чтения на английском языке

All night the madman flees; no matter

Where he may wander at his will,

Hard on his track with heavy clatter

There the bronze horseman gallops still.

Thereafter, whensoever straying

Across that square Evgeny went

By chance, his face was still betraying

Disturbance and bewilderment.

As though to ease a heart tormented

His hand upon it he would clap

In haste, put off his shabby cap,

And never raise his eyes demented,

And seek some byway unfrequented.

A little island lies in view

Along the shore; and here, belated,

Sometimes with nets a fisher-crew

Will moor and cook their long awaited

And meagre supper. Hither too

Some civil servant, idly floating,

Will come upon a Sunday, boating.

That isle is desolate and bare;

No blade of grass springs anywhere.

Once the great flood has sported, driving

The frail hut thither. Long surviving,

It floated on the water there

Like some black bush. A vessel plying

Bore it, last spring, upon her deck.

They found it empty, all the wreck;

And also, cold and dead and lying

Upon the threshold, they had found

My crazy hero. In the ground

His poor cold body there they hurried,

And left it to God’s mercy, buried.

Ruslan and Ludmila

Dedication

For you, queens of my soul, my treasured

Young beauties, for your sake did I

Devote my golden hours of leisure

To writing down, I’ll not deny,

With faithful hand of long past ages

The whispered fables… Take them, pray,

Accept these playful lines, these pages

For which I ask no praise… But stay!

For my reward – I need not seek it —

Is hope: Oh, that some girl should scan,

As only one who’s lovesick can,

These naughty songs of mine in secret!

Prologue

On seashore far a green oak towers,

And to it with a gold chain bound,

A learned cat whiles away the hours

By walking slowly round and round.