Breaking the clock

"Life in the district little resembled life in the places where the Luvers had always lived. Here, the greater part of the day was bare and tedious. There was nothing for the eye to revel in. Whatever it encountered or gazed upon was completely useless except, perhaps, for a birch rod or broom. Coal lay scattered about. Dirty dishwater was poured into the street and immediately grew white, turning to ice. At certain hours the street was full of ordinary people. Factory workers crawled through the snow like cockroaches. Tearoom doors were opened on pulleys and billows of soapy steam poured forth as from a laundry. It was strange as if it had become warmer in the street, as if it had turned to spring, when steaming shirts ran past, round-shouldered, and felt boots flashed by on skinny legs. The pigeons did not fear these crowds. They flew along the road to find some food. Was there a bit of millet, oats, or dung-seed scattered in the snow?  The pieman,´s stall was shining from the grease and warmth. This luster and heat fell into mouths rinsed with raw brandy. The grease inflamed their throats. And then it escaped along the road from their palpitating chests. Was it this that warmed the street?
And then suddenly it became deserted. Twilight fell. Peasant sleighs drove past empty, low sledges moved along swiftly carrying long -bearde men drowned in fur coats, who jokingly pulled the furs over their backs, hugging them bear-fashion. From the sleighs there fell tufts of dullish hay and the slow, sweet thaw of distant bells. The merchants vanished at the turning, beyond the birch grove, which at the distance resembled a paling pulled apart.
The very same crowds who scudded past over her own home, croaking freely, were now flying in her direction. Only here they did not croak. Here, shouting and flapping their wings, they hopped along the fences and then, suddenly, as if at a given signal, threw themselves up into the trees and in unison, nudging each other, took their places on the bare branches. Ah, how one felt then the lateness of the hour -how late it was in the whole world !  So late, ah, so very late, later than any clock could show ! "

The childhood of Luvers - Boris Pasternak