15 quotes
No foreign sky protected me,
no stranger's wing shielded my face.
I stand as witness to the common lot,
survivor of that time, that place.
— 1961
Requiem; 1935-1940 (1963)
The stars of death stood over us.
And Russia, guiltless, beloved, writhed
under the crunch of bloodstained boots,
under the wheels of Black Marias.
Requiem; 1935-1940 (1963)
Already madness lifts its wing
to cover half my soul.
Requiem; 1935-1940 (1963)
A choir of angels glorified the hour,
the vault of heaven was dissolved in fire.
"Father, why hast Thou forsaken me?
Mother, I beg you, do not weep for me..."
Requiem; 1935-1940 (1963)
Today I have so much to do:
I must kill memory once and for all,
I must turn my soul to stone,
I must learn to live again—
Unless ... Summer's ardent rustling
Is like a festival outside my window.
Requiem; 1935-1940 (1963)
At dawn they came and took you away.
You were my dead: I walked behind.
In the dark room children cried,
the holy candle gasped for air.
Requiem; 1935-1940 (1963)
And I pray not for myself alone..
for all who stood outside the jail,
in bitter cold or summer's blaze,
with me under that blind red wall.
Requiem; 1935-1940 (1963)
The word dropped like a stone
on my still living breast.
Confess: I was prepared,
am somehow ready for the test.
Requiem; 1935-1940 (1963)
This woman is sick to her marrow-bone,
this woman is utterly alone,
with husband dead, with son away
in jail. Pray for me. Pray.
Requiem; 1935-1940 (1963)
Now everything is clear.
I admit my defeat. The tongue
of my ravings in my ear
is the tongue of a stranger.
Requiem; 1935-1940 (1963)
That was a time when only the dead
could smile, delivered from their wars,
and the sign, the soul, of Leningrad
dangled outside its prison-house...
Requiem; 1935-1940 (1963)
Such grief might make the mountain stoop, reverse the waters where they flow, but cannot burst these ponderous bolts that block us from the prison cells crowded with mortal woe...
Requiem; 1935-1940 (1963)
No use to fall down on my knees
and beg for mercy's sake.
Nothing I counted mine, out of my life,
is mine to take...
Requiem; 1935-1940 (1963)
I've woven them a garment that's prepared
out of poor words, those that I overheard, and will hold fast to every word and glance
all of my days, even in new mischance,
and if a gag should bind my tortured mouth,
through which a hundred million people shout,
then let them pray for me, as I do pray
for them, this eve of my remembrance day.
Requiem; 1935-1940 (1963)
Not, not mine: it's somebody else's wound.
I could never have borne it. So take the thing
that happened, hide it, stick it in the ground.
Whisk the lamps away...
Night.
Requiem; 1935-1940 (1963)