Siberian Spring Poem by Abraham Sutzkever

I

Multicolored wings begin to flutter
Over taiga wilderness in wind.
And a melted mirror springs and shudders
Over miles, where green seams Just begin.
Snows sing a farewell, a wet, gray chain,
Wings and mirrors full of hues and sound.
With the lion's roaring of the rain
Flares the childish wish to run unbound,
Catching up with all wild streams he misses,
Flying like a bird, he'd soar away:
Over people, forests, rocks, abysses —
To the new, the shining festive day!

II

Shimmering in bright green, the Irtysh
Polishes its metal on the stone.
Wants to find again its waves, its fish,
For again the floes of ice are flown…
And instead of looking dark and grave
Through its only eye, a sawn-out wheel —
It observes through every tiny wave
How the world is spinning in a reel
Round the sun that, daring, from its perch,
Hurls its swords, and now it licks the sweet,
Sparkling ice-shine of a budding birch
As a child licks eagerly a treat.