А всё-таки жаль [A vcyo taki jal] [English translation]

Bygones can't be returned -- and it doesn't need to pity

Every epoch has its own rising forests

And all the same, it's pity, that it's unreal to have a supper

With Alexander Sergeyevich 1

in the "Yar"2

to come in briefly, though for fifteen minutes.

Now we don't need to totter in the streets by touch:

The cars wait for us and rockets carry away us in a distance

And all the same, it's pity, that in Moscow ain't cabmen more

though it would be just one and it won't be from now on -- and it's pity

I'm kowtowing to the boundaryless sea of knowledge,

loving my own smart and multi-experienced century.

And all the same, it's pity, that idols dream us as before,

and till now we feel like the smerds.

Our own victories we were making and carrying them not in vain

We acquired everything -- and sturdy pier and the light...

And all the same, it's pity: sometimes the pedestals evaluate

taller than our victories

Bygones can't be returned --I'm going out the street

and at once I'm noting: just exactly at the Arbat gates

Cabman waits, Alexander Sergeyevich on his walk...

Ah, tomorrow, something happens, probably!

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Pushkin2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yar_(restaurant)

• Artist:Bulat Okudzhava