"You Will Hear Thunder," by Anna Akhmatova

"In 1940," by Anna Akhmatova

 The Penguin Selected Poems of hers, translated by D.M. Thomas, is a great intro to her poetry in English. Somehow she survived WW2 and Stalin's terror--many of her compatriots did not. The Akhmatova House in St. Petersburg, Russia, is now a museum. And there is a Joseph Brodsky room near the entry. You go through a small tunnel just off the street to get to the house, and the walls are covered with poetry graffiti. It's as if everyone has agreed to put only poetry graffiti up there; pretty cool. 

A reading of a short portion of "In 1940", with short video:

Akhmatova poem

"Loving Some is a Heavy Cross," by Boris Pasternak

A poem about how easy, in this case, it is to live with someone whom you love. From the online book, From the Ends to the Beginning: A Bilingual Anthology of Poetry, russianpoetry.net. It goes without saying, but I'll say it anyway, Pasternak was the author of Doctor Zhivago, led eventually to one of my very favorite films, directed by David Lean.

link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8oaaP68i4s

"A Well, and the Cherry Trees, Swaying," by Alexey Tolstoy

Alexey Tolstoy's father was a distant relative of Leo Tolstoy.