I know: yes, no, even I must tear off The delicate daisy petals. Everyone on earth is destined to feel The torments of love. - Anna Akhmatova

I have a lot of work to do today;
I need to slaughter memory,
Turn my living soul to stone
Then teach myself to live again.

He loved three things alone:
White peacocks, evensong,
old maps of America.
He hated children crying,
and raspberry jam with his tea,
and womanish hysteria.
...And then he married me.

1911

They soar, they are somewhere mid-flight,
The words of love and liberation
And I'm succumbing to stage-fright,
My lips – ice cold in trepidation.
But soon, where birches, thin and humble,
Caress the windows with their leaves, -
The voice of the unseen will rumble
And roses will be tied in wreaths.