Cold meager rays that sow
Thin light in the dripping forest.
I slowly carry sorrow
Like a gray bird in my breast.
What shall I do with this broken bird?
The dead sky has nothing to say.
Fog has left the bell tower obscured
Where they’ve taken the bells away.
And the orphaned heights are empty
And fallen still
Like the white abandoned tower
Where fog and silence dwell.
In the morning the long caress
Of half awake and half not —
An endless drowsiness —
The vague chiming of thought …
Osip Mandelstam
(1911)
tags: Mandelstam
