And the bell of the Verbs’ Conjugations

“И глагольных окончаний колокол” by Osip Mandelstam, translated by Rebekah Spearman. A comic poem written in 1912 when Mandelstam was only 21! I’ve tried to preserve the playfulness of the meter and rhyme in English.

And the bell of the verbs’ conjugations
Shows me the path from afar,
to the cell of a modest philologist
Where I can rest from despair.

You forget burdens, dejection,
And the question that haunts me is this:
Is an augment required for the aorist?
What’s the voice of “pepaideukos”?