Seeker Magazine

Selected Poems

by Elisha Porat

Translated from the Hebrew by Elisha Porat and Ward Kelley

MIA . . . His Coming Back
And they waited for his coming back

From this war that never ends:

The unkempt lawn, the untended tree,

The faded plastic chairs,

The narrow rusty gate

And its crying hinges.

His mother, his brother, father and sister,

All frozen inside time: withered

In winter, bowed from days of grief.

His family is certain there will be a day

When he suddenly comes; then everything

In this place will start to move: the grass will grow,

The tree will carry its fruit, the plastic

Chairs become polished, and the narrow

Gate will start to turn, will open,

And never close again.

If only he would come back, only just appear:

The bubble of time will burst,

Their scarred hearts will beat smoothly,

They will drop to their knees, slowly,

And lift their eyes to him,

Weeping their thanksgiving prayer.

Among Their Pictures
In my memory I'm the one who always wanders

Within their pictures: the stretched black

Strips around the gravestone photograph,

The standing twisted flowers,

The burning candles under their icons.

From inside the scene: suddenly, on

The white margins, I see their fingerprints

Which now appear along with their laughing voices;

Their stifled whispers are breaking me.

Oh, how different it should all be

With them, they should be running

With their warm breath panting,

And not inanimate and flaccid

Like they are now, without their lives.

The Young Students
"The young dead soldiers do not speak.

Nevertheless, they are heard in the still houses: who has not heard them?

They have a silence that speaks for them at night when the clock counts."

-- Archibald MacLeish.

On the morning of Memorial Day I walk into the class.

"The young dead soldiers do not speak.

Nevertheless, they are heard . . . "

I read to my young students;

My voice echoes in the silent space of the class.

Their eyes are fastened to my lips,

Fear beats upon my face:

I'm the one who knows,

I'm the one who remembers;

I bite my lip, and begin to cry.

Abruptly I flee from the classroom,

As the eyes of my young students

Drill into the silent space in my brain.

Speak to me, dear children,

How I truly need to hear

Your voices now.

On the Way to Nabbatiya
The path to Nabbatiya is truly unpleasant,

even for veteran soldiers such as myself

who, as you know, "are not killed,

but simply vaporize . . ."

I try to bring a quick smile to the lips

of my escort rangers crew, "What do

we really have to lose?" I ask them,

"we'll go back home, and what good things

are waiting there for us -- boring work,

heart attacks, accidents? But here,

you'll be gone in a minute, all at once,

and you won't even know where the bullet

comes from, the one that rids you of all

your troubles . . .

then you'll be granted a charity,

because you'll finish your life

in 'dignity,' as a brave soldier;

soon you'll be posted in the newspapers,

even the weakest of you who never would

have been absolved -- not for a single word --

in your entire life.

And the principal charity?

You'll remain young forever,

for generations upon generations,

for eternity, and no one can take

this from you."

Then suddenly, unheedingly,

the joke transforms into an unexpected

seriousness . . . the curvature

of the narrow path becomes sharp;

dark, little bridges appear from nowhere,

as the rocks aside the road draw near

with a frightening closeness,

and the dark, green wood

appears suspicious.

(Copyright 2001 by Elisha Porat -Printed with permission- No reproduction without express permission from the author)

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Letter to the Author:
Elisha Porat at porat_el@einhahoresh.org.il
Visit other pages of Elisha Porat's works at:
Porat at ariga.com
Porat at artvilla.com