“You are a dark amulet” (M. Kulbak)

Face of the city – a mask on a mask on a mask.
Cold streets decorated with exorcised spirits.
Polished skeletons demand blood tapped
from near and far.
They lead an endless dance of demand
around the mausoleum of our brilliant exile
deceiving with iscriptions on walls
in Lithuanian, in Polish, and in Yiddish.
Legends pushily demand their respect.
Here you feel like Saul at Ein-Dor
if you remind yourself that you speak Yiddish.
The whole year drunk, but sober on Purim:
that’s how you must live today in Vilna.

                                    Vilna 5765

The truth

By the salt sea you glimpse the whole truth:
the world spread out behind boulders, and the edge
of dead waters along the narrow path
stretching from a foggy A
to the unknown and desired Z.

The eternal gray salt shrubs
escort you disinterestedly, the sand
hangs impalpably in the hot air,
over the rocky slopes –
the pale radiance of a jewel.

The hills of Moab are near and far.
They float lightly above the surface of nothingness,
and there’s no world behind them.
Headless, timeless, risklessly
the path snakes from nowhere to nowhere.

And there are no palms of Ein-Gedi.
It’s a mirage.

                                       Jerusalem 5753

Translated from Yiddish by Zackary Sholem Berger