At s restaurant table, that’s standing aside,
There’s a captain, who’s sitting alone.
"Can I join you"- I asked him. "Come on" - he replied
In a tired and colorless tone.

"Wanna smoke?" he asked. - "On this brand I will pass".
"Then let’s drink, don’t you sit like in palsy".
"To your health" - said the captain while raising his glass.
I responded: "I’ll sure be healthy!"

He grew redder, he rumpled the cloth as we drank,
Then he said: "Vodka’s what you excel in...
Have you really seen a machine gun or tank?
Have you, sonny, attacked under shelling?

At the battle of Kursk in 1943
Just a sergeant I was down there.
So that in the future you’ll live safe and free
I went through blood and deadly despair!

And he asked cursing hard: "What about your dad?
In the army, I guess, he was mustered?
And his blood, I am sure, he also shed,
And you are but a profligate bastard!"

With a rifle at war could you show your worth?
For an error there is no margin!"
I was sitting as if in the trenches of Kursk
Where the captain was simply a sergeant.

He was getting too drunk, chewing herring and crap...
In the end I insulted the stager -
Leaning straight to his ear I told him: "Cap!
You’ll be never commissioned to major!"