Translated from the Hebrew by Rachel Tzvia Back
Rachel Tzvia Back is the recipient of a 2005 PEN Translation Fund Grant.
Under the Olive Tree
By Asher Reich
The light of the olive in this tree
is thick and dark –
the lost blood flows in it.
When I sat under its leaves
time killed itself in the tree's shade.
All the afternoon hours
a figure on the hill
watched me, her face covered in a veil –
and the sun, like me, looked for her eyes
all the afternoon hours
the flute of silence singing in the rocks
as I gnawed nervously at the heavy air.
Years passed between us in fire –
an abundance of blood did not extinguish it.
With straight-necked weariness
we grew dust in our bodies –
but what connects us here
may yet be stitched back together
and heal.
Ballad for an Old Palestinian
By Dvora Amir
The soul is a black forest
the soul is a stone on the crossbar of a well
suspended between two worlds
By day a downy cloud seals the roof of his house. By night
the moon rests on it like a silver jewel in holiday wrapping.
Early in the morning the old man leaves the village,
"The autumn leaves have again painted the sparrows' wings
yellow and orange," he thinks.
He wonders, how does the tree know itself in borrowed colors.
Through naked groves, over stone terraces, he walks to his abandoned village
where he'll meet a few old spirits, friends.
Today it is told among the hills – his grandson was shot.
On a stretched canvas,
on a bed of twigs the boy's body is tossed about.
Evacuated, as one wounded in battle, to a hidden gathering place.
His body is jolted upward, swaying on the storm of mourners,
lifted up brought down, and again floating above as though wanting to rise toward the sky.
"I had a grandson, small, one, mine.
I had a dreaming grandson. With my own eyes I saw how he stood
with closed eyes before the mirror, watching himself dream."
The soul is a black forest
the soul is a stone on the crossbar of a well
suspended between two worlds.
The Letters' Rebellion
By Zvi Atzmon
Fishing boats –
dark moles bobbing up and down,
kept away from the beach until dawn.
The moon's circle is a white patch
on the sea's heart, ECG.
The padded metal helmet leaves little room
for imagination.
From the guava orchards the dull smell
of surrender.
Wind-tears in the open jeep at the security fence.
Smoke from the huts.
Two camels.
A bare-legged old man pulls in a net.
RC is for Radio Contact, and that's an order,
a curfew is a curfew.
RC is for Refugee Camp, it's about time you know this.
Sign here, damn it,
NSB stands for Non-Standard Baton –
any handle of a shovel – efficient, don't worry –
give me your military number, habibi, and signature too.
Rubber is rubber.
Plastic is plastic.
A tire is for burning.
Gas is for tears.
RD is for Reserve Duty.
And a soldier is a soldier.
M-o-o-n is moon.
W-h-i-t-e is white.
And t-h-a-t's that.
Terror. Terrible.
Execution
Gilad Meiri
Our routine patrol identified a suspicious
figure in an abandoned house we surprised
him (or maybe it was her)
and he was caught after a short debriefing
we understood this was a wanted man or actually
a woman (it's hard to tell these days) so
we had to execute him or
her and you must understand we
couldn't take prisoners but
because of what happened to Lorca you know
we received instructions to wait until
there was clearance from headquarters and believe me
or don't in the end we shot him or
her with clearance and all but
later it turned out there was a computer
or human
error and we shot this suspicious
figure for no reason but
because it was a mistake he or
she didn't die or is still not
officially
dead
this kind of thing
was in the newspapers every day
back then and only today
can we talk about it
Excerpted from With an Iron Pen: Hebrew Protest Poetry 1984–2004 (forthcoming from SUNY Press). Copyright © by Rachel Tzvia Back. All rights reserved.
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