About three or four years ago I wrote an English-language rendition of this song. I somewhat regret my rendition because it made multiple allusions to Slavic (neo-)paganism, because I figured that paganism was fittingly “gothic”, without adequately considering the connection between the far right and Slavic neopaganism. This led to by my count two problematic lines in my rendition, one problematic for using the word “rodnover”, and the other for using the word “kolovrat”.
And yet, my lyrics got 60+ likes and a heart from The End of Electronics, before I eventually realized how problematic they were and deleted the comment. I think somebody had tried to point the problems out to me, too, even before that point, but they had phrased it in a sort of vague way that I couldn’t quite understand.
Here’s an edited version of my rendition that replaces the lines I find problematic:
You are the voice stuck in my head
I was alone, You held my palms
You broke them, clawed them 'till they bled
All while You sang Satanic psalms
You are my liege, my crushing dread
And I’m Your lonely, shameful serf
I prayed each night before bed*
For my own death and for rebirth|:You’re the puppeteer in my head
You’re nobody’s worry
You pull strings like I’m already dead
'Till I dig my grave my shame will bury:|A mausoleum in Moskva
Still shone by Soviet svetophors
In deepest dark dreams of toska
With melancholic metaphors
My head fills with Your chilling laugh
When witches dance the Horovod
Their pagan pleasures, strange and saph
No longer drown me, Voievode|:You’re the puppeteer in my head
You’re nobody’s worry
You pull strings like I’m already dead
'Till I dig my grave my shame will bury:||:I dig my grave my shame will bury
My grave:|Between us there’s no division
Your prison is my prize
Yet I can’t fulfill Your vision
So I’ll stab Your staring eyes
Is this freedom, is this death
I groan as my fingers rot**
On my neck, I feel Your breath
Ever damned, just as You’ve wrought|:You’re the puppeteer in my head
You’re nobody’s worry
You pull strings like I’m already dead
'Till I dig my grave my shame will bury:||:My grave:|
*Originally “Rodnover shrines, there I just pled”
**Originally “I groan 'neath the kolovrat”
A side note is that I wrote these lyrics as a way of creatively venting my struggles with my gender identity.
