Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0003334, Mon, 24 Aug 1998 22:16:37 -0700

Subject
poem query (fwd)
Date
Body
From: michael juliar, michael@juliar.com

I need some help. I have a book titled "The Sea and the Honeycomb."
It is edited by Robert Bly, published by The Sixties Press in 1966.
It gives "examples of what has been done so far in Europe and America
with the poem of three or four lines...contains both poems written
originally in English, and poems translated from ancient and modern
languages," according to the dj.

On page 29 is a poem by "Vladimir Nabukov". It goes:

Only the birds are able to throw off their shadow.
The shadow always stays behind on earth.

Our imagination flies:
we are its shadow, on the earth.

The back of the book gives sources for the translated poems:

Solo los pajaros pueden despegarse de su sombra.
La sombra siempre es de tierra.

Nuestra imaginacion vuela:
somos su sombra, en tierra.

Vladimir Nabukov
Translated from the Russian by
Max Aub

Does anyone know where this Pale Fire-like piece is from?

- Michael Juliar