When you were reading those tormented lines - Afanasy Afanasevich Fet

When you were reading those tormented lines
In which the heart's resonant flame sends out glowing streams
And passion's fatal torrents rear up,—
Didn't you recall a single thing?

I can't believe it! That night on the steppe
When, in the midnight mist a premature dawn,
Transparent, lovely as a miracle,
Broke in the distance before you

And your unwilling eye was to this beauty drawn
To that majestic glow beyond the realm of darkness,—
How could it be that nothing whispered to you then:
A man has perished in that fire!

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Afanasy Afanasevich Fet (1820 - 1892) Russia
Translated by A. Wachtel, I. Kutik and M. Denner