It’s pleasant to bicker
over princes and landowners

and somewhat old-fashioned,
sweet as summer-dried hay:

things that are ours, that were
never ours, that were only ours–

you Russians say toska–
a word untranslatable
but so well-felt.

We may argue like old hens
and even this is comforting

but when I say Natasha
should never have ended
up with Pierre 

of course you agree,
though still preferring
Andrei to my Kostya.