R.Gamzatov, The Cranes - Song - Translation (Rus.) Poem by Lyudmila Purgina

The cranes

Text: By Rasul Gamzatov in avarsky language/translated into russian by N.Grebnev

Music - Yan Frenkel


I think sometimes that soldiers long ago,
Who never could return from the bloody leas,
Were buried not into the mellow soil,
But once transformed into the flying cranes.

Since then till date in that blue skies they're flying
And crying us from heavens downwards;
And here's the matter we look up to a row white
With breath abated, heart in the woeful cords.

The row of cranes is flying far and crying
Till end of day drops out of the sight.
And there's, perhaps, one tiny span between them,
Where I could fit when I begin the flight.

The time will come when I have need to join
The row of cranes and fly with them and forth,
And from the heavens I'll cry like that birds
For all you, whom I'd left on dear earth.

I think sometimes that soldiers long ago,
Who never could return from bloody leas,
Were buried not into the mellow soil,
But once transformed into the flying cranes.