Heat up the steam bath for me the "white-way" -
For I [so long ago] have grown unaccustomed to the light of the day.
And I will get mad [by the poisoning fumes from the burning firewood in the stove] and in this hot madness,
The scorching steam will untie and untangle my tongue.

Heat it up, heat it up, you do heat the banya up for me, dear hostess,
I will make myself red-hot until I am scorched, until I burn out.
On the wooden steam bath shelf, [sitting] by the very edge of it,
I will completely erase all the doubts within myself.

And [by this hot steam] I will melt into indecency,
A bucket of cold [water] - and everything is behind!
And the tattoo of the times of the “Personality Cult” [i.e. of the times of Stalin’s reign],
Will [once again] start turning blue on the left side of my chest.

Heat it up, heat it up, you do heat the banya up for me the "white-way" -
For I have grown unaccustomed to the light of the day.
And I will get mad and in this hot madness,
The scorching steam will untie and untangle my tongue.

How much of the Faith and of the Forest [i.e. of the humankind] had been cut down [here],
How much of the torment and the exile had been borne.
And on the left side of my chest - is the half-face tattoo of Stalin,
And on the right side of my chest - is the full-face tattoo of my Marina.

For my unwavering and unshakable Faith,
So many years [could] I have enjoyed the life in paradise.
[Instead] For a hopeless and a dreadful life [without the light of the day in it] had I “traded”
This utter foolishness of mine.

Do heat the banya up for me the "white-way" -
For I have grown unaccustomed to the light of the day.
And I will get mad and in this hot madness,
The scorching steam will untie and untangle my tongue.

Still remembering one very early morning,
How I just only once managed to yell to my brother: "Help out, man!",
And two elegant and well-ordered guards,
Had started carrying me from [my home in] Siberia to [another place in] Siberia.

And then - in the coal mines or in the quarries or in the marshes,
After having swallowed and inhaled tons of tears, mud and dust,
As close as possible to our hearts were we tattooing his “half-faces” [on our chests],
So that he could hear how our hearts were bursting to break free.

Do not heat the banya up for me the "white-way" -
For I have grown unaccustomed to the light of the day.
And I will get mad and in this hot madness,
The scorching steam will untie and untangle my tongue.

Gee, I am burning up with fever because of this “story” - Did it not make you feel very sick?
The steam has driven away all the intelligence and the logic of my mind.
And from the mist of the cold past,
I am diving right into the hot mist [of the present].

[All these] Thoughts have started pounding heavily at the top of my head,
So - as it turns out - I was held up to all of that punishment and branded [as a criminal] for no reason at all.
And I am beating down again and again with the [steam-bath] birch twigs,
On the “legacy” of the old dark times.

You do heat the banya up for me the "white-way" -
So that I [maybe] can get used [again] to the light of this day.
And I will get mad and in this hot madness,
The scorching steam - no, a bucket of cold [water] - will untie and untangle my tongue.