Nikolay Gumilev — Evening

How thick, how wingless an evening!

A sunset like a cracked melon.

You almost want to shove

those limp clouds along.

Slow evenings like this,

coachmen whip their horses to a gallop,

Fishermen tear at the waves with their oars,

woodsmen chop like mad

At huge, bush-headed oaks...

and those who hold in their hands

The universal movement of all things, who keep

all rhythms, past, present, future,

They make poems with wings

and wake the universe from its sluggish sleep.