Текст песни Владимир Высоцкий - Смеюсь навзрыд, как у кривых зеркал

MASKS

Laughing bitterly - like distorting mirrors -
I must have deftly played:
Hooks noses and ears to grin -
As at the Venetian carnival!

Around me closes the ring -
I have enough, engage in dance -
Well, well, my normal face
All probably taken for a mask.

Fireworks, confetti ... But it is not so -
And mask looked at me reproachfully, -
They scream, I once again - not in tact,
That step on partners.

What should I do - run, so hurry?
Or, have fun with them? ...
I hope - the masks of animals
There are human faces.

All in masks, wigs - one and all -
Who - is fantastic, and who - Literature ...
My neighbor on the left - sad harlequin,
Another - the executioner, and the third - just a fool.

One tried to rehabilitate himself,
The other - a person hides from publicity,
And who - no longer able to distinguish
His face a mask of indispensable.

I step into dance, laughing -
Still troubled me with them:
And suddenly someone executioner's mask
I like it - and it does not remove it?

Suddenly harlequin sad forever,
Admiring himself his sad face;
What if your stupid kind of fool
So forget the face normal ?!

How not to miss a good person,
How to distinguish the honest sure I? -
All learned to wear a mask,
In order not to break your face on the rocks.

I am in a secret masks still penetrated -
I am sure that my analysis is accurate:
That mask of indifference at the other -
Protection of spitting and slapping.

1971