Уистен Хью Оден - Эпитафия тирану

Всегда мечтал о неком идеале
И рифмовал доступные слова;
Людскую глупость знал как дважды два,
Заботился о флоте и войсках;
Смеялся – и от хохота патриции рыдали,
А плакал – дети умирали в городках.

Январь 1939



Оригинал:
Epitaph on a Tyrant
By Wystan Hugh Auden

Perfection, of a kind, was what he was after,
And the poetry he invented was easy to understand;
He knew human folly like the back of his hand,
And was greatly interested in armies and fleets;
When he laughed, respectable senators burst with laughter,
And when he cried the little children died in the streets.

January 1939