O Mtatsminda ! Thou Holy Mount ! the sight does haunt
The soul to thought – a place that wilderness has wrought
The dew divine like drops of pearl does grace the site
And, trembling, mingles in delight with soft twilight.
Both solitude and silence rule the place in proud and haughty state!
And from that mount my eyes behold a scene that rapture does create!
Below, the plain with ambrosial flowers is like a heavenly altar spread;
The fragrance like the incense sweet its blessings on the Mount does shed.
I still recall that lovely eve when full of grief
Your paths I trod, O dusky Mount, to seek relief;
My lonely soul in longing clung to twilight fair,
Which sorrow veiled with heaving sighs and beauty rare!
Ah! Nature wove a gentle dream of loveliness and sadness there.
O sky! O sky! You has engraved your image on my heart forever!
And when I gaze upon your blue my thoughts enraptured towards your fly
Alas, they cannot reach your heights, and in the air dissolve and die
Your radiance conceals this fleeting world of woes!
Beyond your realm my soul takes wing to seek repose
From dreary haunts where every cherished hope expires…
But woe! the gods shun man and all his heart’s desires.
In pensive thought entranced I viewed the waning of the heaven’s glow;
Soft twilight wrapt me in her arms and filled with dusk the glens below,
Where rivulets hummed in low response to gentle winds that haunting sighed;
My soul to nature seemed to cleave, and in her bosom’s depth to bide.
O glowing Mount! whose smiles and tears enthrall the breast;
A sight that cheers the heavy heart by cares oppressed.
My grieving soul with gladness now does seem to blend,
And yet, O Mount, your silent mourn’st, my gentle friend.
Deep silence quivered in delight as twilight dimmed the heaven’s dome;
And eve’s sweet star of love and dreams pursued the moon throughout the gloam.
O have you seen a virgin soul, aweary with excess of prayer?
And so the pale and languid moon came floating through the misty air.
Remembrance brings to mind again that eve in May
When twilight veiled the Holy Mount in purple gray,
When over-burdened and distressed, the soul in pain,
Found vent in thoughts that ever in my heart remain.
O lovely eve! your solitude does soothe the soul by sorrow prest!
To you I baste when anguish floods the frenzied brain and burning breast!
The sorrowed heart – the saddened heart – will find its balm and hope in thee,
For morn will break and sunshine’s beam will make the shades of darkness flee.
