Английская поэзия XIV–XX веков в современных русских переводах

Hail, beauteous stranger of the grove!

Thou messenger of Spring!

Now Heaven repairs thy rural seat,

And woods thy welcome ring.

What time the daisy decks the green,

Thy certain voice we hear:

Hast thou a star to guide thy path,

Or mark the rolling year?

Delightful visitant! with thee

I hail the time of flowers,

And hear the sound of music sweet

From birds among the bowers.

The school-boy, wandering through the wood

To pull the primrose gay,

Starts, the new voice of Spring to hear,

And imitates thy lay.

What time the pea puts on the bloom,

Thou fli’st thy vocal vale,

An annual guest in other lands,

Another Spring to hail.

Sweet bird! thy bower is ever green,

Thy sky is ever clear;

Thou hast no sorrow in thy song,

No Winter in thy year!

O could I fly, I’d fly with thee!

We’d make, with joyful wing,

Our annual visit o’er the globe,

Companions of the Spring.

Thy braes were bonnie, Yarrow stream,

When first on them I met my lover;

Thy braes how dreary, Yarrow stream,

When now thy waves his body cover!

Forever, now, O Yarrow stream!

Thou art to me a stream of sorrow;

For never on thy banks shall I

Behold my love, the flower of Yarrow!

He promised me a milk-white steed,

To bear me to his father’s bowers;

He promised me a little page,

To squire me to his father’s towers;

He promised me a wedding-ring,—

The wedding-day was fixed to-morrow:

Now he is wedded to his grave,

Alas, his watery grave in Yarrow!

Sweet were his words when last we met,

My passion as I freely told him;

Clasped in his arms, I little thought

That I should nevermore behold him.

Scarce was he gone, I saw his ghost,—

It vanished with a shriek of sorrow;

Thrice did the Water Wraith ascend,

And give a doleful groan through Yarrow!

His mother from the window looked,

With all the longing of a mother;

His little sister weeping walked

The greenwood path to meet her brother:

They sought him east, they sought him west,

They sought him all the forest thorough;

They only saw the cloud of night,

They only heard the roar of Yarrow.

No longer from the window look;

Thou hast no son, thou tender mother!

No longer walk, thou lovely maid;

Alas, thou hast no more a brother!

No longer seek him east or west,

No longer search the forest thorough;

For wandering in the night so dark,

He fell a lifeless corse in Yarrow.

The tears shall never leave my cheek;

No other youth shall be my marrow;

I ’ll seek thy body in the stream,

And there with thee I ’ll sleep in Yarrow!

The tear did never leave her cheek:

No other youth became her marrow;

She found his body in the stream,

And with him now she sleeps in Yarrow.