Florence Randal Livesay, trans.

From “Old Folk Songs of Ukraina”

GO, my horse, along the road, through the new gates;

And my old mother will come out to meet you.

But tell her not, little steed, that I was drowned—

Tell her, my little horse, that I have married.

Oi! my friends at the wedding are maples drooping over water,

My marriage-brokers are carpenters in the water,

My groomsmen are of the drift-wood,

My kinsmen are the pike in the river,

And my bride—the still waters!