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“Everything promised him to me …” by Anna Akhmatova 🇷🇺 (23 Jun 1889 – 5 Mar 1966)
Translated from the Russian by Richard McKane
Everything promised him to me:
the fading amber edge of the sky,
and the sweet dreams of Christmas,
and the wind at Easter, loud with bells,
​
and the red shoots of the grapevine,
and waterfalls in the park,
and the two large dragonflies
on the rusty iron fencepost.
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And I could only believe
that he would be mine
as I walked along the high slopes,
the path of burning stones.