Mikhail Lermontov: I’m lonely and sad

Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov

(Михаи́л Ю́рьевич Ле́рмонтов 1814 – 1841)

 

I’m lonely and sad

 

I’m lonely and sad, and in moments of bitterest pain

Have no one to look to, alas…

Desires!.. What use to desire without end, without gain,

While all the best years swiftly, fleetingly pass!

 

To love… Whom?.. If briefly, ’tis not worth the effort…

Fore’er?..

Vain longing, since love cannot last.

Look into your heart: joy and torment – all paltry, and there

Remains not a trace of the past.

 

The passions?.. Sweet ailment that reason will easily cure,

A cold word of logic arrest.

And life – what is life if you look round you coolly?-

A poor,

An empty and trivial jest!..

 

1840

 

 

Mikhail Lermontov poetry

kempis.nl poetry magazine

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