Poem of Old Rhythms

 



 
     O you the ancient rhymes and rhythms,
     Seized on by many poets,
     The banal, cheap, and puny ones,
     Cliches overcooked and boiled!
     You sound with the guitar strings,
     With rhythms and rhyme impoverished,
     Than all new things more beautiful
     To my simplistic soul!

     You were under Derzhavin,
     You were under Nekrasov
     You were under Nikitin,
     And under Tolstoy too!
     Oh you - just like an avalanche!
     And though you were discarded,
     And though new ones are written -
     You burst into my book!

     I greet you, my dear loyal ones,
     The fully tried and tested ones,
     The musical and flowerful
     And most beloved by me!
     Exemplary companions
     You dear ones, you tender ones,
     The happy and the sorrowful
     The nightingale-like rhythms!
 
 © Copyright Igor Severyanin