Aleksandr Pushkin

Why hushed you, O, gaiety’s voice?
Resound, the hymns of the Bacchus!
Long live they, who ever had loved us --
The beautiful women and sweet, gentle girls!
Let glasses be full with wines’ gold!
To bottom, that rings,
The sacred gold rings
Let fall through the wine, sweet and cold.
Raise higher your glasses and move them right now!
Long live airy muses, and brightness of brow!
You, hallowed sun, flare on!
Like this icon-lamp is a-paling
In light of the growing dawn,
So all false sagacity’s dimming and failing
By great endless sun of the mind.
Long live holy sun, and let dark die behind.


Translated by Yevgeny Bonver, October, 1999
Edited by Dmitry Karshtedt, November, 1999