Nuptials
three fragments

Song

Our good gentlemen are come,

they have laughed, they have drunk,

going from table to table;

they have laughed, they have drunk,

our good gentlemen are come,

they all toasted our Mashenka:

“Drink Mashenka, my darling,

Mashenka, drink and sit right here...”

“I don’t eat and I don’t drink,

I’m not even listening.”

“If it were a friend to you?”

“I’ve already eaten and drunk, drunk well, too.”

Other Song

Hey you! in the gray skirt,

the roaming one, elsewhither,

where do you come from, fair goose, where do you come from, gray?

You who come from far, where do you come from?

Where do you come from, beauty, what have you seen?

“I was far out to sea, far out in the distant sea.

The white damsel

bathed in the sea,

washed her white dress.”

“Have you seen his damsel,

the white swan, seen his dame?”

“How otherwise when she was there?”

Where the swan is find the dame,

where she is, he’s underwing;

where Fetis is, there’s the one he loves;

she is in bed, he is in bed beside her,

aï louli, aï louli!

Song of the Drunkards

Hey boozehound, old boozehound,

father of Nastasya,

for a glass of wine

you sold your daughter,

and today, look now,

it’s your daughter you’re drinking down.

Igor Stravinsky
tr. after C.-F. Ramuz