Читать книгу The Complete Poems of C.P. Cavafy - Daniel Mendelsohn, Daniel Mendelsohn - Страница 23

Our efforts, those of the ill-fortuned;

our efforts are the efforts of the Trojans.

We will make a bit of progress; we will start

to pick ourselves up a bit; and we’ll begin

to be intrepid, and to have some hope.

But something always comes up, and stops us cold.

In the trench in front of us Achilles

emerges, and affrights us with his shouting.—

Our efforts are the efforts of the Trojans.

We imagine that with resolve and daring

we will reverse the animosity of fortune,

and so we take our stand outside, to fight.

But whenever the crucial moment comes,

our boldness and our daring disappear;

our spirit is shattered, comes unstrung;

and we scramble all around the walls

seeking in our flight to save ourselves.

And yet our fall is certain. Up above,

on the walls, already the lament has begun.

They mourn the memory, the sensibility, of our days.

Bitterly Priam and Hecuba mourn for us.

[1900; 1905]