The Cranes

Poem: Rasul Gamzatov,

Music: Yan Frenkel

English translation: Peter Tempest

I sometimes think that warriors brave,

Who met their death in bloody fight,

Were never buried in a grave

But rose as cranes with plumage white.

Since then unto this very day

They pass high overhead and cry.

Is that not why we often gaze

In silence as the cranes go by?

Across the weary sky they race

In the evening’s dying glow I see

And in their ranks there is a space—

Perhaps they’re keeping it for me?

One day I’ll join the flock of cranes

With them I shall go winging by

And you who here on earth remain,

Will listen to my strident cry.