One from Akhmatova
I’m not asking for your love – / It’s in a safe place now … / please believe me that I won’t write / Jealous letters to your bride. / But take this wise advice: / Give her my poems to read, / Give her my portraits to keep – / Really, you are such a loving pair! / And these little fools need / The sense of total victory / More than friendship’s casual banter / And the memory of the first tender days … / When you have spent the pennies of delight / With your sweetheart / And your surfeited soul / Feels sudden disgust – / Don’t come to me in my triumphant night. / I won’t know you. / And how could I help you? / I don’t cure anyone of happiness.’ (1914)
