Israel in Translation

“Chaim Weizmann once said, in a moment of despair, that there can never be such a thing as a Jewish state, because it contains an inbuilt contradiction: if it is a state it will not be Jewish, and if it is Jewish it will certainly not be a state.”

“In the house which was really a shack, in the laundry room/ on my fingertips, the sourish smell of work clothes/ as I look in your pocket for sweet dates that have been forgotten.”

“We are equal—in bread, roses, love, and sin, / in desiring the wheat stalk that begot a song. / We are equal, the people of my land…”

“… Who sends fear of swallows / into the falcon’s eyes? / Who established the world’s foundations / and set them beneath the skies?”

“On Yom Kippur, in tennis shoes, you ran. / And with Holy Holy Holy, you jumped up high, / higher than anyone, nearly up to the angels on the ceiling.”

“I hereby close the gates between my legs till further notice / For an unlimited period, due to maintenance. / No bearers of first fruit will come / No pilgrims will make pilgrimage…”

“Now in Jerusalem, the Ashkenazi Jews are reciting the Selichot prayers. / The Sephardi Jews began three weeks ago, / chanting El Malei.”

“A mare dances on two strings—that’s how / Ismael’s fingers listen to his blood. The villages scatter / like poppies in the rhythm.”

“Though you swam in the sea, you’re not like a fish, / though you took off in flight, you’re not like a bird— / The towers of Babel you built wrecked / over the man dwelling in the poet’s wings.”

“The whole of my wisdom contracts to the bulk of a fly on a bright window-pane, / what were mountains and vales are but a scratch on glass.”