Ivan Elagin (1918-1987), one of the most significant poets of the Russian diaspora, lived most of his life in the USA. Noted by I. Bunin as a brave and resourceful master of verse, highly valued by I. Brodsky and A. Solzhenitsyn, Elagin, remaining a Russian poet until the end of his days, managed to combine two cultures in his work - Russian and American. His poetic experience in this sense is unique. The second volume includes poems from Ivan Elagin’s collection “Under the constellation of the Ax” (1976), “In the Hall of the Universe” (1982), “Heavy Stars” (1986), poems not collected in books, and the play “Portrait of Mademoiselle Targi” (1949 ).