O this air, intoxicated with sedition, <br />On the black square of the Kremlin. <br />The agitators rock the teetering world . <br />It smells of restless poplars. <br /> <br />The waxen facades of the cathedrals, <br />The thick forest of bells, <br />As if a tongueless bandit <br />Had vanished in the stony rafters. <br /> <br />But in the sealed cathedrals, <br />Where it is cool and dark, <br />Like in delicate clay amphoras, <br />The Russian wine sparkles. <br /> <br />The whole Assumption, wonderfully rotund, <br />The marvel of the arches of Paradise. <br />And the Annunciation, in green, <br />Suddenly seems to start to crow. <br /> <br />The Archangel and Resurrection <br />Show through like a palm, <br />Everywhere the secret burning, -- <br />In the wine jugs a hidden flame.<br /><br />Osip Emilevich Mandelstam<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/o-this-air-intoxicated-with-sedition/
