Eugene Onegin

When I recall how you reacted:

Your frigid glance . . . that sermonette! . . .

But I can't blame you or forget

How nobly in a sense you acted,

How right toward me that awful day:

I'm grateful now in every way. . . .

44

'Back thenfar off from vain commotion,

In our backwoods, as you'll allow,

You had no use for my devotion . . .

So why do you pursue me now?

Why mark me out for your attention?

Is it perhaps my new ascension

To circles that you find more swank;

Or that I now have wealth and rank;

Or that my husband, maimed in battle,

Is held in high esteem at Court?

Or would my fall perhaps be sport,

A cause for all the monde to tattle

Which might in turn bring you some claim

 To social scandal's kind of fame?

45

'I'm weeping. . . . Oh, at this late hour,

If you recall your Tanya still,

Then knowthat were it in my power,

I'd much prefer words harsh and chill,

Stern censure in your former fashion

To this offensive show of passion,

To all these letters and these tears.

Oh then at least, my tender years

Aroused in you some hint of kindness;

You pitied then my girlish dreams. . . .

But now! . . . What unbecoming schemes

Have brought you to my feet? What blindness!

Can you, so strong of mind and heart,

Now stoop to play so base a part?

46

'To me, Onegin, all these splendours,

This weary tinselled life of mine,

This homage that the great world tenders,

My stylish house where princes dine

Are empty. ... I'd as soon be trading

This tattered life of masquerading,

This world of glitter, fumes, and noise,

For just my books, the simple joys

Of our old home, its walks and flowers,

For all those haunts that I once knew . . .

Where first, Onegin, I saw you;

For that small churchyard's shaded bowers,

Where over my poor nanny now