| Deutsch and Yarmolinsky, comps. Modern Russian Poetry. 1921. | | | | Psyche | | By Zinaida Hippius (Mme. Dmitry Merezhkovsky) (b. 1869) |
| | | A SHAMELESS thing, of every vileness capable, | |
| It is as drab as dust, as earthly dust. | |
| I perish of a nearness inescapable; | |
| Its fatal coils about my limbs are thrust. | |
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| A shaggy poulp, embracing me, and pricking me, | 5 |
| And as a serpent cold against my heart, | |
| Its branching scales are poisoned arrows sticking me; | |
| Worse than their bite: repulsion’s horrid smart. | |
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| Oh, were its sting a veritable knife in me! | |
| But it is flaccid, clumsy, still and numb. | 10 |
| Thus sluggishly sucking the very life in me, | |
| A torpid dragon, dreadful, deaf, and dumb. | |
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| With stubborn rings it winds in mute obscurity | |
| And clings caressingly, its purpose whole. | |
| And this dead thing, this loathsome black impurity, | 15 |
| This horror that I shrink from—is my soul. | | | | |
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