If freckles were lovely, and day was night,
And measles were nice and a lie warn’t a lie,
Life would be delight,—
But things couldn’t go right
For in such a sad plight
I wouldn’t be I.

If earth was heaven and now was hence,
And past was present, and false was true,
There might be some sense
But I’d be in suspense
For on such a pretense
You wouldn’t be you.

If fear was plucky, and globes were square,
And dirt was cleanly and tears were glee
Things would seem fair,—
Yet they’d all despair,
For if here was there
We wouldn’t be we.

You will hear thunder and remember me,
And think: she wanted storms. The rim
Of the sky will be the colour of hard crimson,
And your heart, as it was then, will be on fire.

That day in Moscow, it will all come true,
when, for the last time, I take my leave,
And hasten to the heights that I have longed for,
Leaving my shadow still to be with you.

You thought I was that type:
That you could forget me,
And that I'd plead and weep
And throw myself under the hooves of a bay mare,

Or that I'd ask the sorcerers
For some magic potion made from roots and send you a terrible gift:
My precious perfumed handkerchief.

**** you! I will not grant your cursed soul
Vicarious tears or a single glance.

And I swear to you by the garden of the angels,
I swear by the miracle-working icon,
And by the fire and smoke of our nights:
I will never come back to you.

the God I believe in (because of God's self revelation)
loves us far more than we love ourselves.

My heart rests, by the cold fountain.
               (Fill it with threads,
               spider of silence.)

The fountain-water sang it the song.
               (Fill it with threads,
               spider of silence.)

My heart, waking, sang its desires.
               (Spider of nothingness,
               spin your mystery.)

The fountain-water listened sombrely.
              (Spider of nothingness,
               spin your mystery.)

My heart falls into the cold of the fountain.
               (White hands, far-out,
               hold back the water.)

The water carries it, singing with joy.
              (White hands, far-out,
               nothing there in the water!)