The Demon

Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov 1814 (Moscow) – 1841 (Pyatigorsk, Caucasus Oblast)



“...Cold and regretless shalt thou view this sphere,
Where crime’s inseparable from fate,
Where beauty only blossoms to grow sear,
Where all is miserable, where, without fear
No one can either love or hate.
Know’st thou, Tamára, what is mortal love?
A febrile movement of the blood!
Years roll away—the pulse can scarcely move,
Love’s wither’d branches cease to bud.
Who can resist new beauty’s luring bait?
Who, parting, never shed a tear?
Who can withstand the tedium of fate,
The weariness of all things here?
No, my beloved, believe, ’tis not thy lot
To perish in a living grave,
In silence, languish on this narrow spot,
Of brutal jealousy the slave....”

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on May 02, 2023

34 sec read
572

Quick analysis:

Scheme ABAABCDEDBFBGHIHI
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 670
Words 116
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 17

Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov

Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov was a Russian Romantic writer, poet and painter, sometimes called "the poet of the Caucasus", the most important Russian poet after Alexander Pushkin's death in 1837 and the greatest figure in Russian Romanticism. more…

All Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov poems | Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov Books

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