THE DOG
by: Ivan Turgenev (1818-1883)
 S two in the room; my dog and
me. . . . Outside a fearful storm is howling.
-
- The dog sits in front of me, and looks me straight in the
face.
-
- And I, too, look into his face.
-
- He wants, it seems, to tell me something. He is dumb, he
is without words, he does not understand himself -- but I understand
him.
-
- I understand that at this instant there is living in him
and in me the same feeling, that there is no difference between
us. We are the same; in each of us there burns and shines the
same trembling spark.
-
- Death sweeps down, with a wave of its chill broad wing. .
. .
-
- And the end!
-
- Who then can discern what was the spark that glowed in each
of us?
-
- No! We are not beast and man that glance at one another.
. . .
-
- They are the eyes of equals, those eyes riveted on one another.
-
- And in each of these, in the beast and in the man, the same
life huddles up in fear close to the other.
|
"The Dog" is reprinted
from Dream Tales and Prose Poems. Ivan Turgenev. (Trans.
Constance Garnett). New York: The Macmillan Company, 1920. |
MORE
POEMS BY IVAN TURGENEV |
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