and you, vanya

There's a poem that I memorized way back in high school. It's an English translation of a Russian poem--I have no idea who wrote it or translated, and I can't seem to find it anywhere. It came out of the Russian Revolution, a time of national poverty and despair. It went along these lines:


And you, Vanya--
go and cut up that black rooster.

What for?
The little rooster sings to us at dawn.

It sure does.
But to hear it, you must be alive.
And to be alive, you must eat.

Vanya went and cut up the rooster.
Now everyone's alive,
Sitting and listening to the little hen crying,
Cackling for the rooster.




There's something so simplistically obvious about that poem.