Time and love. The novel in verse. George Pospelow

      Phidias19 who turned marble

      into a human,

      compelled it to breathe,

      as every creator

      had the best work

      unfulfilled —

      a graceful figure

      of a girl like you,

      twenty-year,

      so spiritual.

      Stop.

      That’s only

      the first reaction

      towards the effect

      of glorious proportions,

      color and fragrance of your body.

      I’ve got hundreds of proofs

      to show you aren’t a semblance

      of a statue, and deserve many

      more daring comparisons

      for your immortalization.

      Lay. Don’t move. Be a model.

      In Kashmir, I’ll originate easily

      with description words:

      natural colors, inimitable

      in their beauty are all around.

      The eyes are the springs

      feeding the lake

      on which we live

      in a small cabin afloat.

      I dive into.

      They burn me with the cold

      as then at the Caucasus

      after jumping into the river.

      In appearance, they are warm.

      Right away, the long eyelashes

      look prickly, a glance

      from under the raised brows

      seems too determined.

      The rosy cheeks that

      absorbed the aroma of jasmine,

      you picked on the shore,

      indicate that you are not

      a mere Phidias marble,

      you are full of life.

      The long, luxuriant hair —

      lush cedar branches

      against the background

      of the Full Moon —

      slightly closed

      your lovely forehead

      and marvelous roundish chin —

      the kind of things a sculptor

      can’t do justice to the original.

      The half-open tempting mouth

      is a pomegranate broken in two,

      lying close by on the table.

      The proud posture of the head

      tells of an outstanding character,

      uniting the harmony of spirit

      and physical charm.

      Herein helps the neck

      that allows

      the moonlight to soak.

      It drew your beauty,

      in return gave a characteristic

      haze, resembling

      the precise colors of the moonstone

      that you bought today.

      The shoulders are the streams

      of the waterfall

      seen yesterday in the mountains,

      girlish rounded shoulders.

      The inconceivably kind arms —

      I want to kiss their

      every plump inch —

      they refuse to lie calmly,

      gesticulate in rhythm

      to the flow of words

      about your impressions.

      Don’t move,

      or I’ll transform you

      into Venus de Milo20.

      However,

      your arms in ringing bracelets

      and many-colored bands,

      your fingers in shiny rings

      depict Kashmiri dancers.

      They’ll stay as they are.

      The bust of “Miss Universe”

      can’t rival your breasts —

      ripe mango fruits —

      elastic, pliant, quiver.

      The face isn’t in competition,

      while the figures are alike.

      Here you both are rivals.

      If you take part in a contest,

      the Jury of the Universe

      would select you, no doubt,

      a charming terrestrial beauty,

      a feast of youth, the aroma of

      eternity, the infinity of love.

      Your waist is a bridge over Jhelúm21.

      All peoples have their different Hell,

      but their Eden is a variation of Kashmir:

      a valley in the Alps, the Caucasus,

      the Appalachians from hip to hip.

      Precisely in the middle of Elysium,

      over your black triangle

      I lay a walnut figurine

      of the same dimensions:

      a black horse at full tilt

      touches hind legs

      with forelegs, and looks

      as a triangle.

      Today we rushed our horses

      along the Kashmiri valley

      just in the same way.

      Yet, the black horse

      will gallop at full speed

      at the cherished hour,

      and carry us, until bridled,

      through the main entrance

      to the center of paradise.

      It is familiar with the route.

      The extension of the valley —

      the legs

      are of the ancient Indian size,

      neither