Vladimir Vysotsky
TO A SUMMIT
You are walking on a glacier's rim
Looking at the summit that enchants you,
While the sleeping mountains breathe in
Clouds and breathe out avalanches.
But they keep a watchful eye on you
Lest you chance to deviate or stumble,
Every time forewarning you anew
By crevasses and the rockslide rumble.
Smoke created by the bursting shells
Covers passes as a dark prediction,
At the moment you are yet to tell
A snowslide from a wartime affliction.
If you ever asked for some support
The mountains answered with an echo,
That the wind in canyons would transport
Like radio waves within a second.
If a foe appeared once at a pass
In between the ridges, every boulder
Would turn out to be your hiding place,
Every rock would offer you its shoulder.
Nonsense that the clever take a route
That eschews a mountain – for you ventured –
Ice and granite softened underfoot,
And the fog was delicate in nature.
If you are to have your final rest
With the snow to cover you forever,
Then the ridges will become the best
Obelisk to honor your endeavor.
Translated from Russian by Yevgeniy Sokolovsky
К ВЕРШИНЕ
Ты идёшь по кромке ледника,
Взгляд не отрывая от вершины.
Горы спят, вдыхая облака,
Выдыхая снежные лавины.
Но они с тебя не сводят глаз,
Будто бы тебе покой обещан,
Предостерегая всякий раз
Камнепадом и оскалом трещин.
Горы знают: к ним пришла беда —
Дымом затянуло перевалы.
Ты не отличал ещё тогда
От разрывов горные обвалы.
Если ты о помощи просил —
Громким эхо отзывались скалы,
Ветер по ущельям разносил
Эхо гор, как радиосигналы.
И когда шёл бой за перевал —
Чтобы не был ты врагом замечен,
Каждый камень грудью прикрывал,
Скалы сами подставляли плечи.
Ложь, что умный в горы не пойдёт!
Ты пошёл, ты не поверил слухам —
И мягчал гранит, и таял лёд,
И туман у ног стелился пухом…
Если в вечный снег навеки ты
Ляжешь — над тобою, как над близким,
Наклонятся горные хребты
Самым прочным в мире обелиском.
Владимир Высоцкий, 1969
Translator’s biography:
Yevgeniy Sokolovsky was born in Kyiv, Ukraine in 1974, and moved to the United States in 1992. He graduated from Columbia University where he pursued a major in Russian Literature and concentration in Mathematics. An accomplished mathematician and chess player, he currently works as a teacher of mathematics and chess at the International Chess Academy, New Jersey. His translations of Russian poetry have been published in various literary periodicals in the United States. His book of translations of I. Guberman’ s quatrains came out in 2012 enjoying great popularity among the reader.
