Archipelago - Smokey Bastard

Our ship rolls in to Nagaev Bay

Where we’ll toil from the dawn to the last light of the day

Yeah the life of a Zek is one of decaying

Slowly as the form falls from your frame

Kulaks roll in on the endless trains

Torn from the land that they dared to claim

Tyres lashed to their feet where their boots gave way

Their back and barrow doomed to the same fate

2000 miles of dirt beget the Road of Bones

Carved in the snow beneath our hacks and hoes

Checkas and thieves will rob you blind

So carry only that which fills your mind

Darkness forms part of every heart

It’s been within us from the start

Hold memories close for all else goes

Fall to the snow on your knees in the wastes of the Archipelago

All you may own you must carry with you

To mourn for the things that you’ve lost will destroy you

Let your soul be enriched by the friends that surround you

Pray the strength and the will of the good men still holds true

It alone is the seed that must grow to save us

In this ravaged land that the stool pigeon gave us

Father, Father, Heaven save us

Chatter here and there

Careless talk is overheard

And the Black Mariah rolls off like a hearse

Spies are everywhere in this land

Where a question brings a curse

Calls for clemency

Pleading only makes it worse

And the charge is none of your concern

Fall to the snow

On your knees in the wastes of the archipelago.

Sharashka spare me from Kolyma

from the black of the mines and the bite of the taiga

from the lice and the stick and the heel of the Checka

Three months or more mark a true survivor