Just before winter

 Petersburg looked majestic from the sooty window
I could see out to the cathedral towers
I looked back down at my split leather shoes
Mother had given me a hammer to slaughter the rats with

Under the building I almost fell asleep waiting for the rats
a stinging hot dream of my old city in flame
pieces of me burning away until my eyes opened suddenly
And there stood the first corageous rat

I didn't bother getting up Because
 it would just give the creature warning
So I launched the hammer wth precision
Another dead to show mother

If Viktor or the kids from 33 saw this
They would know of my mastery
Out there in the wheat fields
swinging those sickles for a ruble