From beneath a mysterious and ice-cold half-mask

From beneath a mysterious and ice-cold half-mask (1841)
by Mikhail Lermontov, translated by Dmitri Smirnov

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Written in 1840 or 1841, first published in 1843.

* * *

From beneath a mysterious and ice-cold half-mask
Your voice sounded to me as flattering as a dream,
Your charming eyes were shining at me,
And your cunning mouth was smiling.

Through the wispy haze I noticed unconsciously
The paleness of your virgin cheeks and neck,
Lucky creature! I saw a wilful curl
Leaving the wave of its native locks!..

And I created then by these light signs
A lovely beauty in my imagination;
And from that time I carry in my soul,
Caress and love this ethereal apparition.

And all seems thus to me: this lively conversation
I have already heard in the former years,
And someone whispers to me: after this encounter
We will meet again as good old friends.

<1840 or 1841>

This work is a translation and has a separate copyright status to the applicable copyright protections of the original content.

Original:	This work was published before January 1, 1928, and is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago. Public domainPublic domainfalsefalse
Translation:	This work is licensed under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License. The Terms of use of the Wikimedia Foundation require that GFDL-licensed text imported after November 2008 must also be dual-licensed with another compatible license. "Content available only under GFDL is not permissible" (§7.4). This does not apply to non-text media. Public domainPublic domainfalsefalse