Английская поэзия XIV–XX веков в современных русских переводах

Fair lady, when you see the grace

Of beauty in your looking-glass;

A stately forehead, smooth and high,

And full of princely majesty;

A sparkling eye no gem so fair,

Whose lustre dims the Cyprian star;

A glorious cheek, divinely sweet,

Wherein both roses kindly meet;

A cherry lip that would entice

Even gods to kiss at any price;

You think no beauty is so rare

That with your shadow might compare;

That your reflection is alone

The thing that men most dote upon.

Madam, alas! your glass doth lie,

And you are much deceived; for I

A beauty know of richer grace

(Sweet, be not angry), ’t is your face.

Hence, then, O, learn more mild to be,

And leave to lay your blame on me:

If me your real substance move,

When you so much your shadow love,

Wise nature would not let your eye

Look on her own bright majesty;

Which, had you once but gazed upon,

You could, except yourself, love none:

What then you cannot love, let me,

That face I can, you cannot see.

Now you have what to love, you ’ll say,

What then is left for me, I pray?

My face, sweet heart, if it please thee;

That which you can, I cannot see,

So either love shall gain his due,

Yours, sweet, in me, and mine in you.

Come, spur away!

I have no patience for a longer stay;

But must go down,

And leave the chargeable noise of this great town.

I will the country see,

Where old simplicity,

Though hid in gray,

Doth look more gay

Than foppery in plush and scarlet clad.

Farewell, you city-wits that are

Almost at civil war;

’Tis time that I grow wise, when all the world grows mad.

More of my days

I will not spend to gain an idiot’s praise;

Or to make sport

For some slight puny of the Inns of Court.

Then, worthy Stafford, say,

How shall we spend the day?

With what delights

Shorten the nights?

When from this tumult we are got secure,

Where mirth with all her freedom goes,

Yet shall no finger lose;

Where every word is thought, and every thought is pure.

There from the tree

We’ll cherries pluck; and pick the strawberry;

And every day

Go see the wholesome country girls make hay,

Whose brown hath lovelier grace

Than any painted face

That I do know

Hyde Park can show.

Where I had rather gain a kiss, than meet

(Though some of them in greater state

Might court my love with plate)

The beauties of the Cheap, and wives of Lombard Street.

But think upon

Some other pleasures; these to me are none.

Why do I prate

Of women, that are things against my fate?

I never mean to wed,

That torture to my bed:

My Muse is she

My Love shall be.

Let clowns get wealth, and heirs; when I am gone,

And the great bugbear, grisly Death,

Shall take this idle breath,

If I a poem leave, that poem is my son.

Of this, no more;

We’ll rather taste the bright Pomona’s store.

No fruit shall ’scape

Our palates, from the damson to the grape.

Then, full, we’ll seek a shade,

And hear what music’s made:

How Philomel

Her tale doth tell;

And how the other birds do fill the quire;

The thrush and blackbird lend their throats,

Warbling melodious notes;

We will all sports enjoy, which others but desire.

Ours is the sky,

Where at what fowl we please our hawk shall fly;

Nor will we spare

To hunt the crafty fox, or timorous hare;

But let our hounds run loose

In any ground they’ll choose;

The buck shall fall,

The stag, and all.

Our pleasures must from their own warrants be,

For to my Muse, if not to me,

I’m sure all game is free;

Heaven, earth, are all but parts of her great royalty.

And when we mean

To taste of Bacchus’ blessings now and then,

And drink by stealth

A cup or two to noble Berkeley’s health:

I’ll take my pipe and try

The Phrygian melody,

Which he that hears,

Lets through his ears

A madness to distemper all the brain.

Then I another pipe will take

And Doric music make,

To civilize with graver notes our wits again.

I was not borne to Helicon, nor dare

Presume to thinke my selfe a Muses heire.

I have no title to Parnassus hill,

Nor any acre of it by the will

Of a dead Ancestour, nor could I bee

Ought but a tenant unto Poetrie.

But thy Adoption quits me of all feare,

And makes me challenge a childs portion there.

I am a kinne to Hero’s being thine,

And part of my alliance is divine.

Orpheus, Musaeus, Homer too; beside

Thy Brothers by the Roman Mothers side;

As Ovid, Virgil, and the Latine Lyre,

That is so like thy Horace; the whole quire

Of Poets are by thy Adoption, all

My uncles; thou hast given me pow’r to call

Phoebus himselfe my grandsire; by this graunt

Each Sister of the nine is made my Aunt.

Go you that reckon from a large descent

Your lineall Honours, and are well content

To glory in the age of your great name,

Though on a Herralds faith you build the same:

I do not envy you, nor thinke you blest

Though you may beare a Gorgon on your Crest

By direct line from Perseus; I will boast

No farther then my Father; that’s the most

I can, or should be proud of; and I were

Unworthy his adoption, if that here

I should be dully modest; boast I must

Being sonne of his Adoption, not his lust.

And to say truth, that which is best in mee

May call you father, ’twas begot by thee.

Have I a sparke of that coelestiall flame

Within me, I confesse I stole the same

Prometheus like, from thee; and may I feed

His vulture, when I dare deny the deed.

Many more moones thou hast, that shine by night,

All Bankrups, wer’t not for a borrow’d light;

Yet can forsweare it; I the debt confesse,

And thinke my reputation ne’re the lesse.

For Father let me be resolv’d by you;

Is’t a disparagement from rich Peru

To ravish gold; or theft, for wealthy Ore

To ransack Tagus, or Pactolus shore?

Or does he wrong Alcinous, that for want

Doth take from him a sprig or two, to plant

A lesser Orchard? sure it cannot bee:

Nor is it theft to steale some flames from thee,

Grant this, and I’le cry guilty, as I am,

And pay a filiall reverence to thy name.

For when my Muse upon obedient knees,

Askes not a Fathers blessing, let her leese

The fame of this Adoption; ’tis a curse

I wish her ’cause I cannot thinke a worse.

And here, as Piety bids me, I intreat

Phoebus to lend thee some of his own heat,

To cure thy Palsie; else I will complaine

He has no skill in hearbs; Poets in vaine

Make him the God of Physicke; ’twere his praise

To make thee as immortall as thy Baies;

As his owne Daphne; ’twere a shame to see

The God, not love his Preist, more then his Tree.

But if heaven take thee, envying us thy Lyre,

’Tis to pen Anthems for an Angels quire.

Arithmetique nine digits, and no more

Admits of, then I still have all my store.

For what mischance hath tane from my left hand,

It seemes did only for a Cipher stand.

But this I’le say for thee departed joynt,

Thou wert not given to steale, nor pick, not point

At any in disgrace; but thou didst go

Untimely to thy Death only to show

The other members what they once must doe;

Hand, arme, legge, thigh, and all must follow too.

Oft didst thou scan my verse, where if I misse

Henceforth I will impute the cause to this.

A fingers losse (I speake it not in sport)

Will make a verse a Foot too short.

Farewell deare finger, much I greive to see

How soone mischance hath made a Hand of thee.

When age hath made me what I am not now,

And every wrinkle tells me where the plow

Of time hath furrowed; when an ice shall flow

Through every vein, and all my head wear snow;

When death displays his coldness in my cheek,

And I myself in my own picture seek,

Not finding what I am, but what I was,

In doubt which to believe, this or my glass:

Yet though I alter, this remains the same

As it was drawn, retains the primitive frame

And first complexion; here will still be seen

Blood on the cheek, and down upon the chin;

Here the smooth brow will stay, the lively eye,

The ruddy lip, and hair of youthful dye.

Behold what frailty we in man may see,

Whose shadow is less given to change than he!

Goe solitary wood, and henceforth be

Acquainted with no other Harmonie,

Then the Pyes chattering, or the shreeking note

Of bodeing Owles, and fatall Ravens throate.

Thy sweetest Chanters dead, that warbled forth

Layes, that might tempests calme, and still the North;

And call downe Angels from their glorious Spheare

To heare her Songs, and learne new Anthems there.

That soule is fled, and to Elisium gone;

Thou a poore desert left; goe then and runne,

Begge there to stand a grove, and if shee please

To sing againe beneath thy shadowy Trees;

The soules of happy Lovers crown’d with blisses

Shall flock about thee, and keepe time with kisses.