Читать книгу In Praise of Poetry - Ольга Седакова - Страница 37

OLD WOMEN

As patient as an old artist,

I love to look long and hard

at the faces of devout and spiteful old women:

their mortal lips

and the immortal strength

that has pressed their lips together.

(It’s as if an angel sits there,

stacking money into columns:

five-kopeck pieces and lesser ones . . .

Shoo!—he says to the children,

birds, and beggars—

shoo, he says, go away:

can’t you see that I’m busy?)

I look—and I draw a picture in my mind:

myself before a dark mirror.