"Дитя далеких туч! В уединенья…"[88]
Дитя далеких туч! В уединеньи
Не ведаешь ты участи мирской,
Обстала глушь лесов тебя стеной,
И ветра свист поет тебе хваленья.
Морозы ждут лишь твоего веленья. —
Пускай в долине пышет летний зной,
Ты одеваешь саван ледяной,
Тебя хранит великий дух Забвенья.
Но времени рука уже легла
На этот берег дикий и лесистый,
Где некогда царила глушь и мгла,
Огромный лось топтал ковер пушистый
И зверолова меткая стрела
Безмолвия не нарушала свистом.
"How shall I paint thee? — Be this naked stone…"
How shall I paint thee? — Be this naked stone
My seat, while I give way to such intent;
Pleased could my verse, a speaking monument,
Make to the eyes of men thy features known.
But as of all those tripping lambs not one
Outruns his fellows, so hath Nature lent
To thy beginning nought that doth present
Peculiar ground for hope to build upon.
To dignity the spot that gives thee birth
No sign of hoar Antiquity's esteem
Appears, and none of modern Fortune's care;
Yet thou thyself hast round thee shed a gleam
Of brilliant moss, instinct with freshness rare;
Prompt offering to thy Foster-mother, Earth!
Как мне нарисовать тебя? — Присяду
На голом камне, средь хвощей и мхов:
Пусть говорящий памятник стихов
Твои черты явит людскому взгляду.
Но как барашку, что прибился к стаду,
Из блеющих не выбраться рядов,
Так никаких особенных даров
Тебе Судьба не припасла в награду.
Ничем — ни данью древности седой,
Ни щедростью возвышенных примет —
Здесь не отмечено твое рожденье.
Но свежий мох, растущий над водой,
И этот в струях отраженный свет —
Твое Земле суровой приношенье.
The old inventive Poets, had they seen,
Or rather felt, the entrancement that detains
Thy waters, Duddon! 'mid these flowery plains —
The still repose, the liquid lapse serene,
Transferred to bowers imperishably green,
Had beautified Elysium! But these chains
Will soon be broken;-a rough course remains,
Rough as the past; where Thou, of placid mien,
Innocuous as a firstling of the flock,
And countenanced like a soft cerulean sky,
Shalt change thy temper; and, with many a shock
Given and received in mutual jeopardy,
Dance, like a Bacchanal, from rock to rock,
Tossing her frantic thyrsus wide and high!
ДОННЕРДЕЛЬСКАЯ ДОЛИНА[90]
Когда б седые барды были живы
И видели тебя, о Деддон мой,
Они б Элизием назвали берег твой.
Оставил ты свой прежний вид бурливый,
И меж цветов ползут твои извивы
Вдоль по равнине светлою струей —
Но, видно, чужд тенистых рощ покой
Твоей волне свободной и шумливой.
И ты, ягненка робкого смирней,
Огнем небес отсвечивавший чистым,
Вмиг забываешь тишину полей,
Преграды рвешь в своем теченье быстром
И, как вакханка, пляшешь средь камней,
Неистово размахивая тирсом.
I thought of Thee, my partner and my guide.
As being past away. - Vain sympathies!
For, backward, Duddon! as I cast my eyes,
I see what was, and is, and will abide;
Still glides the Stream, and shall for ever glide;
The Form remains, the Function never dies;
While we, the brave, the mighty, and the wise;
We Men, who in our morn of youth defied
The elements, must vanish; — be it so!
Enough, if something from our hands have power
To live, and act, and serve the future hour;
And if, as toward the silent tomb we go,
Through love, through hope, and faith's transcendent
dower.
We feel that we are greater than we know.
ПРОЩАЛЬНЫЙ СОНЕТ РЕКЕ ДАДДОН[91]
В прощальный час, мой друг и спутник мой,
Иду к тебе. — Напрасное влеченье!
Я вижу, Даддон, все в твоем теченье,
Что было, есть и будет впредь со мной.
Ты катишь воды, вечный, озорной,
Даруешь вечно жизнь и обновленье,
А мы — мы сила, мудрость, устремленье,
Мы с юных лет зовем стихии в бой,
И все-таки мы смертны. — Да свершится!
Но не обижен, кто хоть малый срок
Своим трудом служить потомству мог,
Кто и тогда, когда близка гробница,
Любовь, Надежду, Веру — все сберег.
Не выше ль он, чем смертным это мнится!
A Pilgrim, when the summer day
Had closed upon his weary way,
A lodging begged beneath a castle's roof;
But him the haughty Warder spurned;
And from the gate the Pilgrim turned,
To seek such covert as the field
Or heath-besprinkled copse might yield,
Or lofty wood, shower-proof.
He paced along; and, pensively,
Halting beneath a shady tree,
Whose moss-grown root might serve for couch or seat,
Fixed on a Star his upward eye;
Then, from the tenant of the sky
He turned, and watched with kindred look,
A Glow-worm, in a dusky nook,
Apparent at his feet.
The murmur of a neighbouring stream
Induced a soft and slumbrous dream,
A pregnant dream, within whose shadowy bounds
He recognised the earth-born Star,
And _That_ which glittered from afar;
And (strange to witness!) from the frame
Of the ethereal Orb, there came
Intelligible sounds.
Much did it taunt the humble Light
That now, when day was fled, and night
Hushed the dark earth, fast closing weary eyes,
A very reptile could presume
To show her taper in the gloom,
As if in rivalship with One
Who sate a ruler on his throne
Erected in the skies.
"Exalted Star!" the Worm replied,
"Abate this unbecoming pride,
Or with a less uneasy lustre shine;
Thou shrink'st as momently thy rays
Are mastered by the breathing haze;
While neither mist, nor thickest cloud
That shapes in heaven its murky shroud,
Hath power to injure mine.
But not for this do I aspire
To match the spark of local fire,
That at my will burns on the dewy lawn,
With thy acknowledged glories;-No!
Yet, thus upbraided, I may show
What favours do attend me here,
Till, like thyself, I disappear
Before the purple dawn."
When this in modest guise was said,
Across the welkin seemed to spread
A boding sound-for aught but sleep unfit!
Hills quaked, the rivers backward ran;
That Star, so proud of late, looked wan;
And reeled with visionary stir
In the blue depth, like Lucifer
Cast headlong to the pit!
Fire raged: and, when the spangled floor
Of ancient ether was no more,
New heavens succeeded, by the dream brought forth:
And all the happy Souls that rode
Transfigured through that fresh abode,
Had heretofore, in humble trust,
Shone meekly 'mid their native dust,
The Glow-worms of the earth!
This knowledge, from an Angel's voice
Proceeding, made the heart rejoice
Of Him who slept upon the open lea:
Waking at morn he murmured not;
And, till life's journey closed, the spot
Was to the Pilgrim's soul endeared,
Where by that dream he had been cheered
Beneath the shady tree.
