Nikolay Aseyev's poem on money, power, fame and the community of people

People still cling to money,
as people clung to crosses
in the days of the remote Kerzhenets,
but it will not last for ever.
People still reach for power,
not knowing its measure or its price,
but this will not endure for long:
other times will come.
People still chase after glory;
those eager for it are past counting,
trying to remain on earth after death
if only as a faint shadow.
It seems to me that power and honours are salt sea water:
the longer you drink, the more you want,
and the thirst never lets go.
And your personal immortality
lies not in who you are, how you are, where you are,
but in this: the blossoming of all earthly tribes,
the constellation of the people of the planet!
Ever since our globe began to spin,
racing on through eternity,
the great fellowship of people
has for the first time begun to take shape.
So that all, white and black
and yellow, of the earthly brotherhood,
might enter the wide, spacious lands
of common wealth.

Literal translation

Nikolay Aseyev. People Still Cling to Money

Illustration: etching by Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn, “Beggar Man and Beggar Woman”, 1630.