Читать книгу: «Poems of Bedros Duryan», страница 3

5. WHAT ARE YOU, LOVE?

 
WHAT are you, love? A flame from heaven?
A radiant smile are you ?
The heaven has not your eyes’ bright gleams,
The heaven has not their blue.
 
 
The rose has not your snowy breast;
In the moon’s face we seek
In vain the rosy flush that dyes
Your soft and blushing cheek.
 
 
By night you smile upon the stars,
And on the amorous moon,
By day upon the waves, the flowers —
Why not on one alone?
 
 
But, though I pray to you with tears,
With tears and bitter sighs,
You will not deign me yet one glance
Cast by your shining eyes.
 
 
O love, are you a mortal maid,
Or angel formed of light ?
The spring rose and the radiant moon
Envy your beauty bright;
 
 
And when your sweet and thrilling voice
Is heard upon the air,
In cypress depths the nightingale
Is silent in despair.
 
 
Would I, a zephyr, might caress
Your bright brow’s dreams in sleep,
Breathe gently on your lips, and dry
Your tears, if you should weep !
 
 
Or would that in your garden fair
A weeping rose I grew;
And when you came resplendent there
At morning with the dew,
 
 
I’d give fresh color to your cheek
That makes the rose look pale,
Shed on your breast my dew, and there
My latest breath exhale.
 
 
Oh, would I were a limpid brook!
If softly you drew nigh,
And smiled into my mirror clear,
My blue waves would run dry.
 
 
Oh, would I were a sunbeam bright,
To make you seem more fair,
Touching your face, and dying soon
Amid your fragrant hair !
 
 
But, if you love another,
His gravestone may I be !
Then you would linger near me,
Your tears would fall on me ;
 
 
Your sighs would wander o’er me,
Sighs for his early doom.
To touch you, O beloved,
I must become a tomb !
 

6. I HAVE LOVED THEE

 
IT was the hour of dew and light;
In heaven a conflagration cold
Of roses burned, instead of clouds ;
There was a rain of pearls and gold.
 
 
Then deep within a flowering grove
I saw thee, love, reclined at ease,
And thou wast languishing and pale,
And sighing like a summer breeze,
 
 
Plucking a blossom’s leaves apart
With fingers fair as lilies are ;
Thine eyes, the temples of love’s fire,
Were fixed upon the heavens afar.
 
 
I marvelled that thy fingers soft,
Wherein the haughty rose was pressed,
Had power to pluck her leaves away
And scatter them upon thy breast.
 
 
A strange new heaven shone within
Thine eyes, so dark and languishing;
A heaven where, instead of stars,
Arrows of fire were glittering.
 
 
Ah, thou hast made of me a slave
To one bright glance, one word of thine !
The rays thy soul sheds, cruel maid,
Become as fetters laid on mine.
 
 
Oh, leave my heart, from me depart!
I for my queen desire not thee ;
Thy breast is like the rose’s leaf,
Thy heart as granite hard to me,
 
 
Thou knowest naught, thou fragrant one,
Save wounds in tender hearts to make,
Happy when thine adorer’s breast
Bleeds in profusion for thy sake.
 
 
When, lonely in a grove’s deep shade,
I weep, and all my sad heart grieves,
Lo, thou art there! Thou findest me,
Thou speakest to me through the leaves.
 
 
When in the swift and shining stream
I seek oblivion of thy face,
Thou findest me, and from the waves
Thou smilest up with witching grace.
 
 
When to the rocks and mountains steep
To break my heart and lyre I flee,
Thou murmurest ever in the wind
That thou hadst never love for me.
 
 
I will embrace the frozen earth,
And hide from thee in dreamless sleep.
The dark grave is a virgin too ;
Is any other heart so deep ?