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An old Jew asked me near the Jaffa Gate:
“Is the Saxon Garden still there? The same as ever?
Is there a fountain? At the entrance from Czysta Street
In the old days confectioners had a shop there…
A visitor came to the shtetl,
A stranger, with unrest in his step . . .
No-one recognized his unrest. No-one asked him:
“Stranger, are you weary?”
Across the blue sky the evening drew its curtain…
And so its pain is unremitting, like an amputated leg
This ash and feathery void chafes at us,
They say two willows were seen in Mazowsze
wearing green prayer shawls also a market stall
in the middle…
I’m seeking you, Isbilia, my sultana, on the cloudy circle of water where I spread my glance to pierce your reflection, somewhere, between the foam and the wave, on the crest of imperceptible…
And yet she was the jewel of perfection to all far and near
Who had not seen such splendor, all who came from north and south
From all lands and gathered there, the distinguished
Who were drawn to…
The shtetl, lost here among Polish fields and groves, might be called Turek or Przasnysz, Konin or Maków, yet what one remembers is not the name but the old marketplace reeking of tar and dung where a…
You, my dear, will survive me and remember.
How could it be otherwise?
—From a letter
Old people? What can you write about old people?
They barely feel anything!
—From a conversation
…He heard a thud in the living room, heard a thud, and couldn’t identify it: “Are you all right?” he called.
“I was just being careless,” M called back. “I’m all right.”
“You fell. Poor kid. What’d…
The towering life of the towering city
Is burning in white fires.
And in the streets of the Jewish East side
The whiteness of the fires burns even whiter.
I like to stroll in the burning frenzy of…
This year I traveled a long way
to view the silence of my city.
A baby calms down when you rock it, a city calms down
from the distance. I dwelled in longing. I played the hopscotch
of the four…