| |
Translated by T. B. Shaw
O KIEFF! where religion ever seemeth | |
| To light existence in our native land; | |
| Where o’er Petcherskoi’s dome the bright cross gleameth | |
| Like some fair star that still in heaven doth stand. | |
| Where, like a golden sheet, around thee streameth | 5 |
| Thy plain and meads that far away expand; | |
| And by thy hoary wall, with ceaseless motion, | |
| Old Dnieper’s foaming swell sweeps on to ocean. | |
| |
| How oft to thee in spirit have I panted, | |
| O holy city! country of my heart! | 10 |
| How oft in vision have I gazed enchanted | |
| On thy fair towers—a sainted thing thou art!— | |
| By Lavra’s walls or Dnieper’s wave, nor wanted | |
| A spell to draw me from this life apart; | |
| In thee, my country, I behold victorious, | 15 |
| Holy and beautiful, and great and glorious. | |
| |
| The moon her soft ray on Petcherskoi poureth, | |
| Its domes are shining on the river’s wave; | |
| The soul the spirit of the past adoreth, | |
| Where sleeps beneath thee many a holy grave. | 20 |
| Vladimir’s shade above thee calmly soareth, | |
| Thy towers speak of the sainted and the brave; | |
| Afar I gaze, and all in dreamy splendor | |
| Breathes of the past,—a spell sublime and tender. | |
| |
| There fought the warriors on the field of glory, | 25 |
| Strong in the faith against their country’s foe; | |
| And many a royal flower yon palace hoary | |
| In virgin loveliness hath seen to blow. | |
| And Baijan sang to them the noble story, | |
| And secret rapture in their breast did glow. | 30 |
| Hark! midnight sounds—that brazen voice is dying— | |
| A day to meet the vanished days is flying. | |
| |
| Where are the valiant? the resistless lances,— | |
| The brands that were as lightning when they waved? | |
| Where are the beautiful, whose sunny glances | 35 |
| Our fathers with such potency enslaved? | |
| Where is the bard whose song no more enhances? | |
| Ah! that deep bell hath answered what I craved. | |
| And thou alone, by these gray walls, O river! | |
| Murmurest, Dnieper, still, and flow’st for ever. | 40 |
| |
