THE BALLAD OF MY LULLABY
Moyshe-Leyb Halpern [1]
Trans. Kathryn Hellerstein

Once on a wintry evening, when the lamp was not yet
kindled, I cried like all little boys
before going to bed, so my grandmother took me on her lap and this
is what she told me:
Once upon a time there was a king who loved young scallions,
but since he was terribly stubborn, terribly stubborn,
he insisted that he wanted scallions with little red brushes.
-So, what could be done?
-Messengers were sent all over the world, all over the world.
But the messengers wandered a very long time, until they
came, in Promishlan, to Uncle Reb Leybishel.
As you know, Uncle Reb Leybishl was a brushmaker, a
brushmaker, so he took the white brushes out of seven
bunches of scallions and braided in the fringes
of his muffler, of his red muffler that he wore
around his neck winter and summer and all his life.
And thus it happened, that as soon as he bade good-by to his wife
and child he went away with the messengers to the city, to the far
and beautiful and golden city where the king was dwelling, king
was dwelling.
But since then, indeed, no more was heard of him, no
more was heard of him. As if the waters had swallowed him–
As if the waters had swallowed–But since I, who was then a little boy, continued
to cry after all of this, my grandmother concluded that Uncle Reb
Leybishl became at the king’s court a great dignitary, great dignitary.
And she ended with this, that the king had a dear little daughter,
such a pretty dear little daughter, but since once the nursemaid
had stared at an elder with a yellow jacket, the dear daughter
fell down from the attic, and from then on, indeed,
when beloved Purim comes, beloved Purim, and she wants to say
Give me a piece of Purim hallah, she stretches out her little neck
And she says: Give me a piece of pu.
Give me a piece of pu-pu.
Give me a piece of pu-pu-pu.
And she can’t go on-
And she can’t go on-

When The Surgery Is Over
By Yisroel Shtern
(published in Haynt on Sept 1, 1939: see http://www.haynt.org )
Translated by Andrew Firestone[1]

The scalpel knows
We are not ryegrass
It brings a winter snap
A halt to growing
And bids us be alone
Divorced from our own breath:
Between life and life the chloroform strolls
With soft, stealthy
Shadowy steps;
Like a cat leaping
Between two roofs,
Gazing at the world’s expanse.
We sleep and sleep,
Like buildings late at night
Oblivious to what’s taking place above us.
Where are we? Are they really cutting us up
Like fruit,
Fruit that sways
To its last drawing of breath
Into its limbs
Of fragrant gardens
Where a tree still mourns them now?…
Or are we more?
Does something still await us?
And are we just
The sinful sons
Of a wrathful king:
To make of us more faithful bearers of the crown?
They’ve driven us into deserts…
Parched with thirst we drink “Sleeping Potion”.
Comes a sorcerer and with a knife
Carves on our bellies:
“People, you have
already reached
the edge
of the Abyss,
now turn around
and remember!”
we wake up knowing:
no one ever before
saw death so prematurely…
Oh why can’t our bodies be the nights,
The world’s mournful nights,
And while they split us open, have the cock crow:
God’s torn away the darkness, here’s the Dawn!

Efraim Goldbrukh (Ostrolenka)
By Yisroel Shtern
Translated by Jon Levitow

I
Just as one who lies at the feet
of night and bandages his head
with darkness when the awful pain
cuts him with knives long as the years,
when scores of lanterns spit out
light on the sidewalk,
and every spot of light’s a year,
so all his years lie
spit out in the streets,
and he runs off (Heaven also
runs at evening when it sees
everything it owns burnt up,
its last golden coin
worn smooth and proven false…),
he runs off, like a mother
at the funeral of her child
when she can’t see or hear,
but in whose ear with every step,
the wind intones, “Go back!

“If you see your light lie buried
you’ll go mad,
and the children that remain
will have to find another mother…!”
And he runs away and dives
into the darkness like a river’s ditch.
Maybe he has many sins,
or maybe he needs to wake up rich
or to be immersed and purified, —
or to be abandoned, estranged, and pushed aside
because until the wool’s sheared,
it can’t be spun,
and only once that everything is lost,
can G-d be found.

Who knows, then, what his sadness means?
He lies somewhere by a plain,
by a dusty, distant plain,
and as if in a wide “kitl”
in the darkness he is holding
pieces that the world so brittle
has broken off for him; he cries.
Someone’s moving in the distance
with a lantern in his hand.
The shadows start to tremble,
run off sideways,
and creep along the walls,
where they hope to find their savior,
but they fall on him who lies there,
the sad and lonely one who lies there,
and bring to him their supplications.

Just as one who lies at the feet
of night and bandages his head
with darkness that only shadows, who get scared,
don’t know about, still expecting help
from humanstrength,
so you come and cling to me,
downcast Ostrolenka faces,
bowed down like downcast years,
but none of you save one
is close to me — Efraim Goldbrukh.[1]

II

A fine, upstanding Jew — they said,
like they say at the full moon, “A lovely night!”
You were like the moon,
without a home.

Roofs kiss each other tenderly and scarcely move.
The sky like a bluebird shakes itself.
Windows run away from the street looking for dreams of love.
The city lies in sleep up to its neck.

The night bathes itself with wind,
the silent streets its mirror.
Only two thrown open shutters flap
like children who don’t want to take a bath
when they’re already standing in the water.

“Even with a wife, a bed, and a big house,
a man in his castle, he creeps around, a mouse,”
said janitor Zebrovski to the keeper of the dogs:
“Open up, sir! Look! We haven’t hung the rods!”
But you don’t hear, and the stars followed
and helped you find a place to lodge.

III

You sleep somewhere like a beggar on a sack, yourself a sack.
Your age creaks as you rise with rooster’s reveille.
Your home is full of perfume: so alive are the flowers
on your carpets… and a bed of fine mahogany

stands tall, all alone, awaiting no owner
and dozes in cool linen as in fresh, deep snow.
Don’t be offended, Efraim Goldbrukh, that you’ve been
tossed out, like a fly from a spotless glass of tea,
from a wealthy house.

It’s dangerous for someone who doesn’t know
that only rich menmay eat fine pastry,
to run around and yell,
“How is it that children in the slums eat shards of
glass from hunger,
when by rights to the poor both property and G-d Himself belong?!”

And your kapote, Mr. Goldbrukh, is really no river,
so why suddenly beneath its hem appears
a living fish? You swiped it from your joy
and you bring it to a weak and pregnant woman.

Is that normal? Leave such things in a drawer.
All will be lost if the payments burn up with the store.
Don’t take it hard, Efraim, that you’ve been cast off.
You were in a wealthy house: a heartless letter in a tender envelope.

IV

So, alright, now it’s Friday, everyone knows:
at highway’s end the horizon’s warmed up.
Look, Efraim: in heaven khales are being baked
for the Sabbath.

And at Yosel the cobbler’s they’re dying for lack of food.
You just have to choose: good Jews, knead
a penny into a loaf of bread.

And when evening adds tongues of flame
to white clouds,
one sees that already up above candles
are being lit in silver candlesticks.

And Widow Leahke has to sit in darkness?

So, anyway, it’s Friday, and you understand
a man does what he can.
But all week long? G-d preserve us:
from the first specks of day
until the night begins — he just recites,
with a tallis around his head, recites — — —

V

The clouds mingle and riffle by without a sound.
The day opens quiet and holy
like an old book that unfolds in fearful sweetness.
The sun emerges like a beautiful thought.

Obediently, the streets become more pure.

The town has shaken sleep from its eyes
as one wipes the dust from household things on Pesakh-eve.
Even Horki the tailor, already bent by his machine,
sews more chapters of the Psalms than shoulder twill.

And what does Efraim Goldbrukh do?
He prays.

Noontime lies across the world, burning with anger and ashamed;
over him is poured kerosene, salt, soap, and flour.
He loves the people, shines with love, but is a stranger to them,
and he lies there while they skin him and sell off his hide…

Goods go to market, the sun goes through the sky,
pouring out golden heaps of barley and wheat;
clouds catch the rays of sunlight in their mouths
like novices who seek out bargains on new grain
with straws held in their teeth.

And what does Efraim Goldbrukh do?
He prays.

Yet the day has ended even more beautifully than it began.
The streets lie peaceful and blue like a river.
And like doves the soft moments of dusk fly over them,
and the sun prepares a key of blood
for a door of heavy gold

enclosing a king’s domain… and bent in pious contemplation
brick houses that were so proud an hour ago
stand like clever people who have seen a lot
and finally see only this: that a person must believe…

And Khatzkel Kupfermintz doesn’t understand what suddenly is with him.
In his heart it burns so much, and like a child he holds his head against the window panes
and looks into the market, and shadows fall to earth and hug the stones.
He stands inside the store – forgets – remembers – and wants to cry.

And what does Efraim Goldbrukh do?
He prays.

VI

Reb Efraim! Reb Efraim!
How can a man not do
a thing all day but pray?
The world sets great store
on a beautiful front tooth.

People look the world in the mouth,
throw in a bit of earth and stars,
and immediately they expect clay dishes.
It would be hateful, awful,

If on the other side a tooth falls out,
bending (like a troubled conscience),
the tooth in front would get yanked out
and create a dark hole for eternity.

One weighs a heart out slowly on the scale,
like bars of honey and pieces of earth, like honeycake,
so, how can a person twenty-four hours a day
do nothing but pray?

VII

And Efraim Goldbrukh answers:
— — — — — — — — — — —
— — — — — — — — —