In high noon's heat in a Caucasian valley
I lay quite still, a bullet in my breast;
The smoke still rose from my deep wound,
As drop by drop my blood flowed out.
I lay alone upon the valley's sand;
The mountain ledges closed in all around,
Sun burned their yellow peaks
It burned me, too-but deep as death I slept.
I dreamt I saw the shining lights
Of evening feasting in my homeland.
Young maids with flowers in their hair
Spoke gaily of me 'mongst themselves.
But one maid sat apart in thought
And did not enter gaily in,
Her youthful soul was caught it seemed,
Lord God knows how, in some sad dream:
She dreamt about a valley in the Caucasus;
She knew the corpse that lay upon the ground;
His breast was blackened by a smoking wound,
His cooling blood was flowing in a stream.
