O war! what thou know’st about, comrade?
How cruel the soldiers’ fate is!
Heard thou how called death thy old crony,
With whom thou’st a pood of salt eaten?

How speedily pillagers go for
To get hold of other persons’ things,
How overlarge can be dishonor,
When there haps the failure to win.

Both cows and old women are lying
There in the gray ash on the ground,
And one can’t hear even the cock’s crying,
But flies are who live in this town.

How bullets and shells scream, how horrible,
Before thy dead fellow, thy fault...
And it seems that all’s to no profit,
And there are “before war” and “war”...

There was a lad, who once lived in our village,
He had a youthful bride with raven hair,
That self-same year when she and he turned twenty
Came war, and tore him from his bride so fair.

The hero’s bride is now a hero’s widow.
Her hair is gray, her eyes have lost their fire;
Their son, who bears his father’s name so precious,
Today is older than his fallen sire.