Anna Akhmatova - Time Quotes

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It was a time when only the dead smiled, happy in their peace.

Anna Akhmatova

But I warn you,
I am living for the last time.

Anna Akhmatova

You will come in any case — so why not now?
How long I wait and wait. The bad times fall.
I have put out the light and opened the door
for you, because you are simple and magical.
Assume, then, any form that suits your wish,
take aim, and blast at me with poisoned shot,
or strangle me like an efficient mugger,
or else infect me — typhus be my lot —

Anna Akhmatova

That day in Moscow, it will all come true,
when, for the last time, I take my leave,
And hasten to the heights that I have longed for,
Leaving my shadow still to be with you.

Anna Akhmatova

Why is this century worse than those others?
Maybe, because, in sadness and alarm,
It only touched the blackest of the ulcers,
But couldn't heal it in its span of time.

Anna Akhmatova

No foreign sky protected me,
no stranger's wing shielded my face.
I stand as witness to the common lot,
survivor of that time, that place.
— 1961

Anna Akhmatova

That was a time when only the dead
could smile, delivered from their wars,
and the sign, the soul, of Leningrad
dangled outside its prison-house...

Anna Akhmatova