Anna Andreyevna Akhmatova (June 11, 1889 – March 5, 1966) was a Russian poetess, translator, and literary scholar, one of the most significant figures in 20th-century Russian literature. She was born near Odessa (Bolshoy Fontan). The daughter of mechanical engineer Andrey Antonovich Gorenko and Inna Erazmovna, née Stogova. The girl was the third child. There were six children in total in the family. A year later, the head of the family received a position in the government body of State Control, and they moved to Tsarskoye Selo. There, little Anya touched the exciting world of the Pushkin era, admiring the splendor of architectural monuments, parks, and squares of the town, which inspired the creativity of the young literary genius. She learned to read from a school manual authored by Count Tolstoy called "Alphabet," which included riddles, fables, and short stories, and she mastered French by listening to the teacher who taught the language to her older sister and brother. She grew up as an individualist, spending summers visiting her grandfather near Sevastopol, where for her recklessness and capriciousness she was nicknamed "wild girl." As a pseudonym, Anna Andreyevna took the surname of her great-grandmother, a Tatar woman named Akhmatova. Anna wrote about herself that she was born in the same year as Charlie Chaplin, Tolstoy's "Kreutzer Sonata," and the Eiffel Tower. She witnessed the change of eras—survived two world wars, a revolution, and the siege of Leningrad. Akhmatova wrote her first poem at the age of 11—and from then until the end of her life, she never stopped writing poetry. In 1890, the family moved first to Pavlovsk and then to Tsarskoye Selo. In Tsarskoye Selo, the Gorenko family settled near the station, in the house of the merchant widow Evdokia Ivanovna Shukhardina, where they lived until 1905. This house was a hundred years old in the 1890s. It stood at the corner of Shirokaya Street and Nameless Lane. The elders said that in this house "before the cast-iron railway," that is, before 1838, there was a roadside inn or tavern. Unfortunately, this house has not survived to the present day; now a festive Station Square is located in its place. The green, damp splendor of parks, pastures where Anna was taken by her nanny, the hippodrome where small spotted horses galloped, the old station, marble statues, palaces, and much more... All this later entered into the "Tsarskoye Selo Ode"...

Along the alley, horses are led.

The long waves of combed manes.

Oh, enchanting city of mysteries,

I am sad, having fallen in love with you.

Akhmatova called Tsarskoye Selo the city of poetry, a city forever connected with Pushkin. The poetess carried her love for Pushkin throughout her life; he was a constant source of inspiration for her. In Tsarskoye Selo, Pushkin became especially close to her. This feeling is beautifully conveyed in the poem.

Sources:

https://uznayvse.ru/znamenitosti/biografiya-anna-ahmatova.html

https://antennadaily.ru/2019/06/25/peterburg-akhmatova/

http://kfinkelshteyn.narod.ru/Tzarskoye_Selo/Uch_zav/Mariinskaya_gimn_uch.htm

http://www.nashaepoha.ru/?page=obj93178&lang=1&id=2201