Only to walk to the sea of pines,
only to search for the golden fleece…
You can try to forget prison,
if the eye of the needle is handed to you.

One can try and stitch life and death with paces.
One can look through the needle's eye and sing
something about the ripple and the firmament.

How good it is in the bitter water!
Examine it in profile and full face
through the opening of keen disaster
that has pierced us with exile.

Regina Derieva
© Translation from Russian by Richard McKane