Перевод стихотворной дуэли Цветаева-Парнок

Meeting

Marina Tsvetayeva to Sophia Parnok:

I can’t help recalling that moment,
That smell of White-Rose* and tea,
Those Sevres porcelain little statues,
Placed over the hot fireplace…

I wore an evening garment
Decorated with golden silk.
You wore a black knitted jacket,
Complementing your fair face.

I remember how you entered,
How your cheeks were pasty white,
How you stood, biting your finger,
Having tilted slightly your head.

And your forehead, mighty and prominent,
Head of red hair, blossoming light.
Who were you? A boy or a woman?
“Must be stronger than me!”, - I sensed.

I stood up,  moving gratuitously,
People gathered around us.
I heard someone saying jokingly:
“Meet each other, messieurs, mesdames”.

And you put your hand, unhurriedly,
In my hand, with assured trust.
And you squeezed it, lightly, tenderly,
I felt scorching ice in my palm.

Expecting a row with a person
Who was looking at us ascance,
I remained reclined on the chair,
Fiddling a ring with my hand.

You took out a thin papirosa**,
And I reached for a match at once,
And gave you a light, unaware
What to do if you give me a glance.

We then clinked our glasses together
Over a fragile cerulean vase.
I announced: “Oh, be my Orestes!”,
And I gave you a flower gift.

From a black bag, bound in leather,
With your gray-colored eyes on my face,
In a slow, unhurried gesture,
You took out and dropped handkerchief.
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*Perfume
** Unfiltered cigarette


Sophia Parnok to Marina Tsvetayeva:

“You appeared before me like a shy little girl”
Pierced my heart with an arrow of Sappho’s poems!
And I thought at the nighttime, caressing your curls
That my passion to motherly care was growing, -
 “You appeared before me like a shy little girl”.

You avoided my kiss putting me in a whirl,
I’m recalling your eye with incredible iris…
When you entered my life like an exquisite pearl,
Wrapped in love and affection, enarmored, desirous,-
“You appeared before me like a shy little girl”.

You surrendered to passion like pliable gold,
I lean towards your face, where pallor remains,
White as snow, with traces of sensual twirls…
I still cherish, my sweetheart, those memories when
“You appeared before me like a shy little girl”.