Бажанов, А. Стихи и поэмы о саамском крае = Verses & poems on the Saami land / Аскольд Бажанов ; English translation by Naomi Caffee ; with an essay by Johanna Domokos. - Berlin : Nordeuropa-Institut der Humboldt-Universitat, 2009.

1 5 7 The bloom of childhood (an epic) In a modest little tundra spot, enclosed by moss-covered boulders, on the shore o f a wide river, there stood a few houses. No one knows exactly when they were built by a Saami craftsman out of kingly, firm pine-trees soaked in tar. On that northern forest clearing, asleep in primeval silence, the fairy tales and poems became more precious to me than store-bought toys. Now behind the light-blue mountains at the granite bulwark of wintery years, I see that clearing more and more often, although it’s long been gone. Three decades have passed between us, and the scar o f war has not healed, having pierced the northern summer with its light, dreamlike nights! And memory requires you to return, the river calls to you in waves, and childhood, dressed in a bobtail jacket, beckons you from far away. In it you find that you forget the number o f years, the grief of hardship, too bad if the water is stagnant, and they say there are no miracles. So at least let the memory o f a ragged footpath be scrubbed clean by the long deluge o f days, lead me to that little field, which might no longer exist! The springtime forest is wonderous with its faint w hiff of tar,