Osip Mandelstam

I was washing outside at night

I was washing outside at night -
the firmament shone with coarse stars.
Beam of a star, like salt on an axe
the full barrel freezing.

The gates are locked
and the earth in all conscience is so stern;
I doubt if one could ever find a base
purer than the truth of fresh canvas.

Like salt a star thaws in the barrel
and the ice-cold water is blacker,
death purer, trouble more saline
and the world more honest, more terrible.

1921

Translated by Richard McKane, from Ten Russian Poets, 2003,Anvil/Survivors' Poetry,

ISBN 0-85646-328-0. Price £12.95, available from Survivors' Poetry (0207-281-4654)