Ballad of When the Going’s Rough

Translated from Hungarian. 

Approved, the irregular going by regulations,
approved, the permitting of disobedience,
rubber-stamping each other, then
       the real carnival will be us:
we’ll drop in, bringing festival to the living,
       stretching one another
upon a cross is still not for us,
       enough if our trousers
stretch tightly upon us, that’s sacrifice enough;
homeland of homelands, don’t truss us in wet canvas,
have us sprawl rather on rich sofas,
right away victory to the mausoleum of pitchforks,
no rib-tickling with cold steel today, what’s come
is song’s maximum; my tight-shut window
shatters in the caterwauling, going dancing’s hip,
if machine-guns could shout we’d have had them
start shouting-down real quick, but instead we let
       our machine-gun throats rattle on;
see, dad, how our symbols do headstands
for us; ticky-tacky’s just a tactic
for ideal confraternity, a recommendation
            for blush-pink
keeping the faith; they ask you instead of brooding
       to smarten up here;
festivities, and what festivities:
doves deep-fried fly up straight for our mouths;