The soul of Sergey Essenin

He was born in the Russian village,
And the fame was his goal;
He had caught this deceitful Phoenix,
But he had lost his soul.

He saw no deceit, he decided,
The moth, to the starry start,
And at first he did not noticed,
That his soul from him was apart.

His soul was fair as the maiden.
What without him would she do?
And she fascinated many
Men and women too.

One among them was the dancer
With her heavy fate in strife;
She said, that she loved him truly,
And he named her his wife.

For her he was not the poet,
But only the dangerous whim;
She was in love with his soul,
And certainly not with him.

And their rapture led them to rupture,
And he put her in the wrong;
He tried in vain to ascertain,
That his beloved was his song.

And his song was beloved really,
But only by his people;
And his astounding glory
Was for him lonely steeple.

And suddenly he suspected,
Touching the sullen star,
That his soul is caressed and tortured,
Seduced by the commissar.

And he in despair hanged himself,
And opened at first his vein;
He hoped with his blood to attract her,
But he hoped also in vain.

She wandered from one to another
In attempt to emigrate;
At last she remembered something,
She came, but she came too late.

It was too late for deploring,
It was impossible to crave;
One day the corpse of the woman
Was found on his lonely grave.

She lacked not at last of courage
Repentantly to decide;
Who knows, that his soul is Russia,
Eternal suicide?

1995.