Poems and Songs of Vladimir Vysotsky. A Ballad of Fighting.

The Mystery of Hippies.Translated by Akbar Muhammad.

We’ve left our homes for good and all.
God’s on our side, man won’t harm us.
We’re sons of yours, our dads and moms,
But we’re unruly, prodigal sons.

On your old track, we’ve done our stint,
It makes no sense to wait for us —
We won’t come back under your wings,
Nor sorry be about the past.

A lie is
 

 
 your eternal warmth!

A lie is
 

 
 your uncurved life course!

Corrupted
 

 
 are your hearts and souls!

We lack for no one thing of yours!

Don’t tell us of good and bad,
All the bonds have been torn off:
Now a mom hasn’t her fat lad,
Nor has his little one a dad,
There are no your state and law.

How many townships have been trashed,
How many lives have been broken off
With the assist of yours, our dads,
Who taught us not to break God’s words,

While, at odd moments, ye groped girls
And, at the trials, did your jousts —
Your rotten morality and codes
We’ve shaken from off our feet as dust!

God damn
 

 
 your compositions and films!

God damn
 

 
 the things ye immolate!

God damn
 

 
 what on your conscience is!

All your god-awful tales we hate!

Squeeze out money in a rage,
But without us ye’re obliged
To perform your buys and sales:
Know that we feel a distaste
Even when ye take a delight!

Our home stands ’mongst the o’ergrown grounds,
The sky’s its roof, the trees are walls.
’Mongst people, we’re said to be outcasts,
Strange aliens from the other worlds.

We’ll rather go with lack of food,
Without confession, draw the last breath,
Than breathe in the same air with you,
Collect what ye count to be wealth.

Get lost
 

 
 with your red-letter days!

Get lost
 

 
 with your auspicious marks!

We ought
 

 
 to find unbeaten ways

For our posterity and us!

The soothsayers and foreseers
Said that we’ll come to a pickle.
Well, in the junkyard we’ve lived,
And with all our knack of it
Put a spoke in Progress’ wheel.

So, friend, lay for us thy course,
Don’t pin hopes on later on!
Cast off the eternal curse,
Thou’lt find here thy own bros,
We’ll take thee with heart and soul!

1973.

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