translating poetry, on a lighter note

[Jules Levin]

In contemplating some recent issues of literary translation, a couplet 
of my long-ago youth popped into my head:
John Greenleaf Whittier's "Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the 
saddest are these--it might have been."  In my youth poetry was still a 
popular art form in America; newspapers published verse every day, and 
workingmen like my father memorized long "manly" poems--Robert Service, 
etc.   This was not great poetry of course.  Anyway, I wondered how one 
would translate "it might have been" into Russian poetic language.  If I 
wanted to produce the thought in a normal conversation, I would just 
say  Eto, mozhet byt', bylo by tak..., or some such.  But has Whittier 
ever been translated?  Is there a more poetic construction?  (The 
couplet in English does rise above a conventional spoken speech style, 
in my opinion.)
Jules Levin
Los Angeles

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