'Is my destiny so changed,'

by Anna Akhmatova

　　Is my destiny so changed,

　　Or the game really over?

　　Where are those winters I'd go to bed

　　At six in the morning?

　　Newly tranquil and severe,

　　I'm living on a wild coastline,

　　No longer able to utter

　　A single kind or idle word.

　　Can Christmas soon be here?

　　The steppe is touchingly green.

　　The sun glows. Lapping the shore

　　There's a warm-looking wave.

　　When tired, languid from happiness,

　　I used to dream of such quiet,

　　With unutterable wonder,

　　And thus I imagined myself,

　　A posthumous, wandering soul.