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Lydia Grigorieva

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Waterloo Bridge

to Valentina Polukhina

Long as a train the Mirabeau Bridge of Apollinaire
went down the slope. Or was it Kamenny Bridge in Moscow?

Above the Thames the bridge flows to the South Bank
in a petrified powerful stream.
The cars race down calcified veins,
like red and white bullocks.
There’s no end to the fantasies on the theme . . .
Mirabeau Bridge and Moscow’s Kamenny,
on tiptoes with envy
look on with all their eyes. On the continent
there are no equals to their glory.
But there, over the reddish Thames,
stubbornly propped on the banks,
sparkling like a running line,
famous and tough, it seethes like the depths,
indistinguishable from mountain waters.
It flows over the Thames –
and races into the ages.

And under the bridge – dark and monotone –
the water hangs, like the arch of Wellington.

[31.12.96]

Translated by Richard McKane

Page(s) 146

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