We shall meet again in Petersburg (Osip Mandelstam)

Chased by these lines by the poet Osip Mandestam who wrote these lines in the labor camp where he died:

We shall meet again in Petersburg,
as though there we’d buried the sun,
and for the first time, speak the word
the sacred, the meaningless one.
In black velvet of the Soviet night,
in the velvet of earth’s emptiness,
flowers still flower everlasting, bright,
women sing, beloved eyes are blessed.



The city is arched there like a lynx,
the bridge-patrol stands its ground,
an angry motor dissects the mist
crying out with a cuckoo’s sound.
I don’t need a pass for tonight,
I have no fear of the guard:
I’ll pray in the Soviet night
for the sacred meaningless word.

[...]

trans. A. S. Kline