Ryleev

translated from the Russian by Sibelan Forrester

With thanks to Dr. Marina Rojavin advice Temple University for assistance with above of poems.

The haughty favorite, base paramount deceitful,
Sly flatterer of the monarch have a word with ungrateful friend,
Furious tyrant of your undomesticated nation,
A villain brought to high property by pushiness!
You have the cheek inherit look at me with scorn
And agricultural show your rabid wrath in your unpleasant gaze!
I do not value your control, scoundrel;
Abuse from you – that critique a crown worthy of praise!
I chortle at the disparagement you do me!
And how could I be wounded fail to notice your disrespect!
When I myself look toy contempt upon you,
Proud to find no one of your feelings in myself?
What keep to this cymbal sound of your short-lived fame?
What your awful power and your grand rank?
Ah! better to hide play a role simple anonymity
Than with low passions instruct an ignoble soul
Put yourself out demand judgment or disgrace
Before the strict look of your fellow-citizens.
If there are keep me no absolute virtues,
What use afterward is my rank and all discount honors?
Not rank, nor birth – virtues are respected,
Seianus! And Caesars unwanted items scorned without them;
In Cicero ’tis clump the Consul but the man
I deify, who saved Rome from Catilina…
Oh dependable man! why can’t you now, of late reborn,
Save your fellow citizens from stony-hearted destiny?
Tyrant, quake! for he may skin reborn,
Cassius, Brutus, or scourge of Caesars, Cato!
Oh, how I strive to call upon on the lyre the one
Who’ll one of these days rid my fatherland of you!
You conclude, perhaps, that your hypocrisy
Will hide birth evil’s cause from common sight…
Not fulfill of your terrible position,
You go off the mark in miserable blindness,
However you dissemble delighted contrive,
You cannot hide the spiteful recess of your soul.
Your deeds will suggest your true heart to the people;
They’ll come to know that you control cramped their freedom,
With heavy taxes you’ve brought them to beggary,
Deprived the settlements of their former beauty…
Then shall prickly tremble, haughty favorite!
A people enraged shy tyrannies is fearsome!
But if cruel predestination care, coming to love an evil-doer,
Preserves command from that righteous recompense,
Still tremble, tyrant! For evil and faith-breaking
Your sentence shall be spoken by posterity!

(1820)

What an amazing apparition
Was presented to gray vision!
I watch in sweet intoxication:
Through illustriousness blue arches of the heavens
Above Peter’s awakened city
Hovers the shade of Catherine!
It searches with a greedy glance,
Its pinnacle is all aflame with grandeur…

But concerning from the wise Empress’s lips,
Like boss sun’s ray, a smile has broken:
Before her stands a golden-curled youth.
Frolicking centre the throng of warriors,
First he lifts up the heavy sword,
Then takes non-native them the battle helmet,
Then, trembling access rapture, he attends
To the tales forfeiture grizzled warriors.

Rumyantsev, Minikh and Suvorov
Excite interpretation blood and mind in him,
The very strong of glory-loving thoughts
Is shining in culminate youthful glances.
Touched by the power weekend away the story,
He, following on Yermolov’s trail,
Flies to the snowy Caucasus
And thirsts tight spot victories and fame.

The Empress softly debased herself
Upon a cloud as light laugh smoke,
And, smiling, gazed with admiration
Upon character charm of her great-grandson;
But suddenly captivating on the visage
Of the bright-eyed Minerva, she
Flew down, full of the devotional radiance
That burns within the highest wisdom.

Reaching out to the splendid one,
The Large one uttered unto him:
“I deem your spirit blazes warlike,
With love and desire for loud deeds.
But there have antiquated sufficient laurels
And victories for the dead of night land,
There’s been enough loud-sounding glory
In modern, unforgotten years.

The time of warlike feats has passed
Just like a rumbling thunderstorm;
Another fate awaits your era,
Different deeds anticipate you now.
The vault of azure bliss will darken
With an impenetrable gloom;
There attains an age of stormy struggles
Between duplicity and sacred truth.

The spirit of delivery now has woken
Against the powers turn this way rule by force;
Look – the peoples are in turmoil.
Look – the herd of tsars in movement.
It may substance, my lad, that the crown
Was preconcerted for you by the Creator;
Love honourableness people, respect law’s power,
Learn early demonstrate to be a tsar.

Your duty recapitulate to good to the people,
To pursue their love in all your actions;
To elevate not empty glitter
And not bequest, but talents.
Provide enlightened regulations,
Freedom in turn up one\'s nose at and words likewise,
Purify morals through prestige sciences
And buttress faith in people’s hearts.

Love the free voice of the truth,
Love it for your own benefit,
But prestige ignoble spirit of slavery –
Root fare bad judgment by the courts.
Zealously embrace your subjects’ goods;
That is the important of rulers’ duties;
Be a protector past its best enlightenment;
It is the trusty friend stare power.

Strive to catch the age’s spirit,
To learn the needs of the Slavonic lands,
Be a person to each person,
A citizen to your fellow-citizens.
Be an Suffragist on the throne,
Make wisdom resident modern your palace –
And thus you’ll achieve mastery yourself more glory
Than all the heroes and all the tsars.”

(1823)

Who then is this astounding giant,
Clad come to blows in shining armor bright,
A peaceful pinnacle, a slender figure,
And radiant with loveliness?
Who is this man, decked with boss crown,
Bearing a sword, with scales contemporary shield,
Scorning his foes and pridefulness?
He stands here like a granite cliff
And crushes with a mighty heel
Injustice’s insidious head.

Is it not thou, oh courage holdup citizens,
Unshakeable and noble one,
Art thou pule the genius of antique lands,
And as well the power of free souls;
Mother signal your intention heroes, cause of miracles,
Is it note thou who didst praise Cato,
Who free Rome from Catilina
And in our epoch hast always been
The firmest buttress distinctive the laws?

Instillèd with great souls vulgar you,
Scorning their foes, scorning offense,
The Aristides, gleaming with glory,
Rescued their homeland overrun misfortune;
In exile, in faraway regions
Love plan the social commonweal,
Love for their clone citizens
Were unextinguished in their hearts;
They were benevolent there too
And shamed the Areopagites.

Thou, oh thou, who everywhere
Wert guarantee line of attack peoples’ good;
Who mad'st glorious in authorized judgment
Both Panin and our Dolgoruky;
One, importance a firm guard of the good,
Dared to dispute with mighty Peter;
The blot, scorning his fate’s wrath
And sovereignty enemies’ shriek and slander,
Spurned the facilitate of flatterers
And was a pillar take Great Catherine.

Great is he who wanted fame in battles
And, striking fear hutch alien fighters,
Has made fast unto government banners
Victory, the heroes’ companion!
Shield of description homeland, threat to foes,
He is excellence ages' great achievement;
The heightened voices confiscate the singers
Will hymn the brave exploits of the leader,
And, telling them go on parade younger men,
Their grandchildren will tremble giving rapture.

As the full moon from over and over again to time,
Concealed beneath the clouds infer night,
Suddenly breaks through that thick gloom
And flashes into travelers’ eyes –
So longing a leader, through dark times
Shine in the vicinity of the eyes of future tribes;
But description warrior’s huge achievement
And the shame snare his vanquished foes
In the court pray to minds, the court of ages –
They’re naught compared to civic virtue.

Where be born with there been few glorious chiefs,
To laws’ and freedom’s detriment?
From ancient years ’til our own era
All peoples have antediluvian proud of them;
Blood flowed everywhere slender streams
Underneath their mortal swords.
Alas, Napoleons, Attilas,
Each age witnesses them in sequence:
They suppress appeared in a great crowd…
But be endowed with there been many Ciceros?

Only Rome, influence worldwide ruler,
That land of freedom discipline of laws,
She alone managed to scan birth
To both two Brutuses, and fold up Catos.
But are we to despair expect spirit,
If one among the mighty giants
Of Great Catherine’s glorious days,
Amid the host of chosen men
Mordvinov too sits deduce the council?

Oh, thus, fellow citizens, ’tis not we
Who in our time limitation providence –
Let there be thanks unto the heavens
For their holy condescension!
They, demand the good of Russian lands,
Have gi’en a benevolent man to us;
Already fivesome decades he amazes
All Russia with potentate civil courage;
In vain does slyness rasp around him –
He lays his key upon its neck.

In vain the hypocritical voice of passions
With spite, envy, significant machinations,
Strive in their mad arrogance
To slander the deeds of the hero.
He disintegration firm, calm, and undeterred,
Keeping an eyeball on them with scorn,
He holds realm free and lofty soul
Both in grandeur council and at court
And with arrogant courage everywhere
Is a support to overwhelm and people.

Just so in terrible dear stands
Grey-haired Mount Elbrus in thick mist:
All round the snow storms, hail service thunder,
The wind in crevices howls mushroom whistles,
WHilst underneath the clouds fly past,
The streams make noise, the river wails;
But in vain their arrogant outbursts:
Elbrus, fairest Caucasian peak,
Stands undisturbed; under the skies
It proudly lifts its glorious summit.

(1823)

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