In the Wood
Boris Pasternak 1890 (Moscow) – 1960 (Peredelkino)
Blurred by a lilac heat, the meadows:
in the wood, cathedral shadows swirled.
What on earth was left for them to kiss? So
like wax, soft in the fingers, theirs, the world.
There’s a dream – you do not sleep, you only
dream you long for sleep: someone’s dozing,
two black suns are beating under eyelids,
burning eyelashes, while he’s slumbering.
Sunbeams play. Iridescent beetles flow by,
dragon-flies’ glass skims over his cheek.
With tiny scintillations, the wood’s alive,
like those the clockmakers’ tweezers seek.
It seems he slept to the tick of figures,
while in acid, amber ether, over his head,
the hands of a carefully tested clock quiver,
regulated precisely by tremors of heat.
They calibrate, they shake the pines,
scatter the shadow, exhaust and pierce
the darkness of timber raised up high,
in the day’s fatigue, on the blue clock-face.
It seems a primal happiness was setting,
it seems the wood was sunk in sunlit dream.
Happy folk don’t spend time clock-watching,
but this pair were only sleeping, it seems.
Font size:
Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 07, 2023
- 52 sec read
- 91 Views
Quick analysis:
Scheme | XAXA XBXB CDXD XXXX XXCX BXBX |
---|---|
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 1,025 |
Words | 175 |
Stanzas | 6 |
Stanza Lengths | 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4 |
Translation
Find a translation for this poem in other languages:
Select another language:
- - Select -
- 简体中文 (Chinese - Simplified)
- 繁體中文 (Chinese - Traditional)
- Español (Spanish)
- Esperanto (Esperanto)
- 日本語 (Japanese)
- Português (Portuguese)
- Deutsch (German)
- العربية (Arabic)
- Français (French)
- Русский (Russian)
- ಕನ್ನಡ (Kannada)
- 한국어 (Korean)
- עברית (Hebrew)
- Gaeilge (Irish)
- Українська (Ukrainian)
- اردو (Urdu)
- Magyar (Hungarian)
- मानक हिन्दी (Hindi)
- Indonesia (Indonesian)
- Italiano (Italian)
- தமிழ் (Tamil)
- Türkçe (Turkish)
- తెలుగు (Telugu)
- ภาษาไทย (Thai)
- Tiếng Việt (Vietnamese)
- Čeština (Czech)
- Polski (Polish)
- Bahasa Indonesia (Indonesian)
- Românește (Romanian)
- Nederlands (Dutch)
- Ελληνικά (Greek)
- Latinum (Latin)
- Svenska (Swedish)
- Dansk (Danish)
- Suomi (Finnish)
- فارسی (Persian)
- ייִדיש (Yiddish)
- հայերեն (Armenian)
- Norsk (Norwegian)
- English (English)
Citation
Use the citation below to add this poem to your bibliography:
Style:MLAChicagoAPA
"In the Wood" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 6 Jun 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem/4505/in-the-wood>.
Discuss the poem In the Wood with the community...
Report Comment
We're doing our best to make sure our content is useful, accurate and safe.
If by any chance you spot an inappropriate comment while navigating through our website please use this form to let us know, and we'll take care of it shortly.
Attachment
You need to be logged in to favorite.
Log In