Tamir Lahav-Radlmesser: “Father Visits his Childhood Home”

Year Book by Tamir Lahav-Radlmesser

(30)
FATHER VISITS HIS CHILDHOOD HOME

FATHER: We arrived at the city.
I didn’t give the driver an address,
I directed him
right left right left
until I got to the house.
I moved at age eight,
fifty years I hadn’t been there
and even so I remembered the way.
ME: and then…?
FATHER: I stepped out of the cab,
I stood on the sidewalk across from the house
and stared.
ME: and then…?
FATHER: Nothing.
The house was unchanged.
It remained exactly as I’d remembered it,
maybe a bit smaller.
ME: and then…?
FATHER: Nothing.
ME: What’s nothing?
You didn’t cross the street?
You didn’t enter the stairwell?
You didn’t knock on the door?
FATHER: No.
For what? I
do not believe
in psychology.

–Tamir Lahav Radlmesser, Year Book
Tel-Aviv: Am Oved Press (2003)
Translation, M. Salomon

Tamir Lahav-Radlmesser: “אבא אבא / father father”

Year Book by Tamir Lahav-Radlmesser

(11)
אבא אבא מה היה
מה היה שם
מה קרה
ביערות
מה במחנות
ספר ספר
שאדע
מה קרה
לי שם
–תמיר להב-רדלמסר׃ ״תמונת מחזור״
תל־אביב : עם עובד,2003

(11)
father father what was it
what was it there
what happened
in the forests
in the camps
tell it tell it
so I’ll know
what happened
to me there
–Tamir Lahav Radlmesser, Year Book
Tel-Aviv: Am Oved Press (2003)
Translation, M. Salomon

Eran Tzelgov: “L’at l’at / Little by Little”

 

לְאַט לְאַט
כָּל חָתוּל
מְאַמֵּץ
אֶת הֲלִיכַת הָאָדָם שֶׁלּוֹ
אֵין דֶּרֶךְ אַחֶרֶת
כָּכָה זֶה
בֵּין סַנְטֵר נוֹטֵף חָלָב
לְצִפּוֹר שְׁבוּרַת כָּנָף
לְאֶרֶס מְדַמֵּם עַל אֲהוּבָה שֶׁהָלְכָה לָהּ
עָקֵב בְּצַד אֲגוּדָל בְּצַד צְלוֹחִית לְצַד מַגָּף
אוֹתָהּ יְלָלָה
מַבָּט מַבְהִיק
וְאֵימַת הַתְּנוּעָה הַפִּתְאוֹמִית בַּחֲדַר הַשֵּׁנָה
לְאַט
כָּל חָתוּל מְאַמֵּץ
כָּכָה זֶה

חָתוּל

ערן צלגוב–

Photo: CaT’S shaDoW by DiFo&Natura

Rachel: “And maybe…”

AND MAYBE

And maybe those things never really were,
maybe
I never rose at dawn to the garden,
to work the earth in my fury?

Not once on those harvest days, so searing
and so long,
atop the cart that brimmed with fattened sheaves,
did I not give my voice to song?

Did I never cleanse myself in the innocence
and blue calm
of my Kinneret…oh, my Kinneret-
were you? Or did I dream it?

–Rachel (1927)

Translation by M. Salomon, dedicated to Myra Sklarew

Photo credit: Israel–December 1981–Sunset Lake Kinneret by Prora

Guillevic: “L’éternité / Eternity”

L’ÉTERNITÉ . . .

L’éternité
ne fut jamais perdue.

Ce qui nous a manqué
Fut plutôt de savoir

La traduire en journées,
En ciels, en paysages,

En paroles pour d’autres,
En gestes vérifiables.

Mais la garder pour nous
N’était pas difficile

Et les moments étaient présents
Où nous paraissait clair
Que nous étions l’éternité.

-Eugène Guillevic

Aryeh Sivan: “To Live in the Land of Israel”

TO LIVE IN THE LAND OF ISRAEL

To the memory of Zvi Hurvitz:
Pioneer, commander, and bereaved father.

To be cocked like a rifle, the hand
clutching a pistol, to walk
in a closed, harsh line, even after
the cheeks are filled with dust,
and the seared flesh is fallen away, and the eyes can no longer
focus on a target.

There is a saying: a loaded gun is bound to fire.
Not true.
In the Land of Israel, anything can happen:
a broken pin, a spring rusted through,

or, the sudden cancellation of your orders, without explanation,

as it once happened to Abraham on Mount Moriah.

–Aryeh Sivan (1984)

Translation by M. Salomon

Photo credit: Jerusalem by premasagar

Czesław Miłosz: “One More Contradiction”

ONE MORE CONTRADICTION

Did I fulfill what I had to, here, on earth?
I was a guest in a house under white clouds
Where rivers flow and grasses renew themselves.
So what if I were called, if I was hardly aware.
The next time early I would search for wisdom.
I would not pretend I could be just like the others:
Only evil and suffering come from that.
Renouncing, I would choose the fate of obedience.
I would suppress my wolf’s eye and greedy throat.
A resident of some cloister floating in the air
With a view on the cities glowing below,
Or onto a stream, a bridge and old cedars,
I would give myself to one task only.
Which then, however, could not be accomplished.

–Czesław Miłosz

Translation by Robert Hass

Wisława Szymborska: “Brueghel’s Two Monkeys”

BRUEGHEL’S TWO MONKEYS

This is what I see in my dreams about final exams:
two monkeys, chained to the floor, sit on the windowsill,
the sky behind them flutters,
the sea is taking its bath.

The exam is History of Mankind.
I stammer and hedge.

One monkey stares and listens with mocking disdain,
the other seems to be dreaming away–
but when it’s clear I don’t know what to say
he prompts me with a gentle
clinking of his chain.

–Wisława Szymborska

Translation by Stanisław Barańczak & Clare Cavanagh

Dan Pagis: “Conversation”

 CONVERSATION

Four talked about the pine tree.  One defined it by genus, species, and variety.  One assessed its disadvantages for the lumber industry.  One quoted poems about pine trees in many languages.  One took root, stretched out branches, and rustled.

–Dan Pagis

Translation by Stephen Mitchell

Photo credit: pine-tree by Naomi Ibuki

Paul Éluard: “Couvre-feu / Curfew”

COUVRE-FEU

Que voulez-vous la porte était gardée
Que voulez-vous nous étions enfermés
Que voulez-vous la rue était barrée
Que voulez-vous la ville était matée
Que voulez-vous elle était affamée
Que voulez-vous nous étions désarmés
Que voulez-vous la nuit était tombée
Que voulez-vous nous nous sommes aimés.

—Paul Éluard

CURFEW
What did you expect the door was guarded
What did you expect we were locked in
What did you expect the street was barred
What did you expect the city was in check
What did you expect it was starving
What did you expect we were disarmed
What did you expect the night had fallen
What did you expect we were in love.

Translation by Lloyd Alexander

Photo credit: Tunnel of Love by idatewe

Robert Marteau: “Innommé Toujours/Unnamed Always”

INNOMMÉ TOUJOURS . . .
Innommé toujours est le monde, hors de nous
la vasque où le saule prend racine, où le cerf
vient boire, hors de nous l’axe qui joint les vertèbres,
hors de nous la glande florale, et la chevelure
qui tombe du miroir au sommet.

-Robert Marteau

UNNAMED ALWAYS . . .
Unnamed always is the world, outside of us
the basin where the willow takes root, where the stag
comes to drink, outside of us the axis that joins the verterbrae,
outside of us the floral gland and the long hair
that falls from the mirror at the zenith.

Translation by Louis Simpson

Photo credit: Mirror shot by delviking

Anna Akhmatova: “In Memory of M.B.”

Памяти М. А. Булгакова

Вот это я тебе взамен могильных роз,
Взамен кадильного куренья;
Ты так сурово жил и до конца донес
Великолепное презренье.

Ты пил вино, ты, как никто, шутил
И в душных стенах задыхался,
И гостью страшную ты сам к себе впустил
И с ней наедине остался.

И нет тебя, и все вокруг молчит
О скорбной и высокой жизни,
Лишь голос мой, как флейта, прозвучит
И на твоей безмолвной тризне.

О, кто поверить смел, что полоумной мне,
Мне, плакальщице дней погибших,
Мне, тлеющей на медленном огне,
Всех потерявшей, все забывшей, -

Придется поминать того, кто, полный сил,
И светлых замыслов, и воли,
Как будто бы вчера со мною говорил,
Скрывая дрожь предсмертной боли.

—Анна Ахматова

Mарт 1940, Фонтанный Дом

 

 

Osip Mandelstam: “Notre Dame”

NOTRE DAME

Where a Roman judge framed laws for alien folk
A basilica stands, original, exulting,
Each nerve stretched taut along the light cross vaulting,
Each muscle flexing, like Adam when he first woke.

If you look from outside you grasp the hidden plan:
Strong saddle-girth arches watchfully forestall
The ponderous mass from shattering the wall
And hold in check the bold vault’s battering ram.

A primal labyrinth, a wood past men’s understanding,
The Gothic spirit’s rational abyss,
Brute strength of Egypt and a Christian meekness,
Thin reed beside oak and the plumb line everywhere king.

Stronghold of Notre Dame, the more my attentive eyes
Studied your gigantic ribs and frame
Then the more often this reflection came:
From cruel weight, I too will someday make beauty rise.

–Osip Mandelstam

Translation by Robert Tracy

Photo credit: Inside Notre Dame by BiLK_Thorn

Pasolini: “Supplica a mia madre / Prayer to my mother”

Supplica a mia madre

È difficile dire con parole di figlio
ciò a cui nel cuore ben poco assomiglio.

Tu sei la sola al mondo che sa, del mio cuore,
ciò che è stato sempre, prima d’ogni altro amore.

Per questo devo dirti ciò ch’è orrendo conoscere:
è dentro la tua grazia che nasce la mia angoscia.

Sei insostituibile. Per questo è dannata
alla solitudine la vita che mi hai data.

E non voglio esser solo. Ho un’infinita fame
d’amore, dell’amore di corpi senza anima.

Perché l’anima è in te, sei tu, ma tu
sei mia madre e il tuo amore è la mia schiavitù:

ho passato l’infanzia schiavo di questo senso
alto, irrimediabile, di un impegno immenso.

Era l’unico modo per sentire la vita,
l’unica tinta, l’unica forma: ora è finita.

Sopravviviamo: ed è la confusione
di una vita rinata fuori dalla ragione.

Ti supplico, ah, ti supplico: non voler morire.
Sono qui, solo, con te, in un futuro aprile…

—Pier Paolo Pasolini (b. 5 March 1922)

Constantin Cavafy: “Days of 1903″

 

DAYS OF 1903

I never found them again–all lost so quickly…
the poetic eyes, the pale face…
in the darkening street…

I never found them again—mine entirely by chance,
and so easily given up,
then longed for so painfully.
The poetic eyes, the pale face,
those lips—I never found them again.

—C. P. Cavafy

Translation by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard

Photo credit:  5alexandrie1 by wispalex