So much gossip talk today our ears acquire! So much rumor pests on us akin to moths! For example, there are rumors that all prices will be higher by two twenty and especially ordinary salt. Gossips travel like your flies, they unravel many lives, and the toothless ancient ladies sow them deep in people’s minds. "Oh my gosh, a day before a trench was opened, they dug up two underground cognac wells." "Rumor has it: spies have poisoned the tap water with plain moonshine, and all bread today is made of herring scales." Gossips travel like your flies, they unravel many lives, and the toothless ancient ladies sow them deep in people’s minds. "They are building a new city, altogether underground, as a protection from those nukes." "Have you heard? Soon bathhouses will be closed forever, universally, and that, my friend, is certainly a truth." Gossips travel like your flies, they unravel many lives, and the toothless ancient ladies sow them deep in people’s minds. "That’s not biggie! Nowadays everything is canceled, just the same as the parade1 was killed as well." "Rumor is that the whole lot will soon be annulled. God almighty, they’ll ban everyone to bloody freaking hell!" Gossips travel like your flies, they unravel many lives, and the toothless ancient ladies sow them deep in people’s minds. "And Mamýkin2 will be given marching orders: for debauchery, for drinking, for misdeeds..." "By the way, they’re taking one of your close neighbors, such a scoundrel, he’s a look-alike with Béria3, it seems." Gossips travel like your flies, they unravel many lives, and the toothless ancient ladies sow them deep in people’s minds. Forged in numerous turmoils and commotions rumors go around unhindered and expand. Rumor has it that there will be no more gossip absolutely; there’s new gossip that all rumors will be banned. Gossips travel like your flies, they unravel many lives, and the toothless ancient ladies sow them deep in people’s minds. So, they sing to one another, shout or whisper, And the wicked rumors always sound so true. The good rumors always are dismissed by people for some reason; they are saying it’s all fantasies and bull. Gossips travel like your flies, they unravel many lives, and the toothless ancient ladies sow them deep in people’s minds.
1 Refers to the cancellation of the military parade on the 1st of May.
2 A coach of one of the major soccer clubs in Moscow.
3 The notorious chief of the Soviet security during Stalin’s reign. Soon after Stalin’s death Beria was arrested, tried for treason and other offenses and sentenced to death.
 
© Kirill Tolmachev. Translation, 2022