Sergey Esenin
Cigarette Pedlars

Avenues so wretched,
snowbanks, bitter frost.
Desperate little urchins
with trays of cigarettes.
Wandering dirty avenues,
enjoying evil games –
all of them are pickpockets,
all are jolly thieves.
That bunch takes Nikitskaya,
this – Tverskaya Square.
They stand, sombrely whistling,
the livelong day out there.
They dash to all the barrooms
and, with some time to spare,
they pore over Pinkerton
out loud over a beer.
Let the beer be bitter –
beer or not, they’re soused.
All rave about New York,
all dream of San Frantsisk…
Then again, so wretchedly,
they walk out in the frost –
desperate little urchins
with trays of cigarettes. 

Translated by Boris Dralyuk