Hey, you sharp little con men!
The wind is in your head.
In Pugachovian sheepskins
Down Moscow’s streets I tread.
It wasn’t for this we had
The great truth on our side,
So in sables and trotters
All these mockers could ride.
It wasn’t for this the foe
Poured out his blood like water,
So you’d see strings of pearls
On every street hawker.
No sense chattering teeth
All this night long.
I will sail, I will sing
Down the Volga, the Don!
I’ll set out in the blue
In my evening skiffs.
Who’s beside me in flight?
Beside me — only friends!
____
* This poem protests Lenin’s New Economic Policy (NEP) period inaugurated in 1921.
Эй, молодчики-купчики,
Ветерок в голове!
В пугачевском тулупчике
Я иду по Москве!
Не затем высока
Воля правды у нас,
В соболях — рысаках
Чтоб катались, глумясь.
Не затем у врага
Кровь лилась по дешевке,
Чтоб несли жемчуга
Руки каждой торговки.
Не зубами — скрипеть
Ночью долгою —
Буду плыть, буду петь
Доном-Волгою!
Я пошлю вперед
Вечеровые уструги.
Кто со мною — в полет?
А со мной — мои други!
«The rules of winter we obey. / We roll a snowball and run after, / Acclaim its growth with peals of laughter, / And brush the surplus snow away. As if misfortune were in view, / The people passing by assemble / Along the fence with lips atremble / To watch what you and I shall do. We m...»
«I watch the scooter's flight / And feel my envy growing! / My eyes are hot and bright / With summer's quick tears flowing. A girl with winning smile / Clings closely to the rider. / A humpy sluggish snail / Do I appear beside her. Farewell! Ride at your ease / To where green summits ...»
«Our sacred craft has existed / For thousands of years.... / With it, luminous even in darkness is earth. / But no poet has ever insisted, / Through laughter or tears, / That there is no wisdom, no age, no death.»
«In all the world no people are so tearless. / So proud, so simple as are we. / 1922 In lockets for a charm we do not wear it, / In verse about its sorrows do not weep, / With Eden's blissful vales do not compare it, / Untroubled does it leave our bitter sleep. / To traffic in it is a t...»