Gali-Dana Singer
translated from the Hebrew by Lisa Katz
Letters to Ona
First Letter
You don’t even know what it is: to remember a river,
approach, force yourself to think: River.
What did you see? A Greek in a creek from a children’s song and many names of bridges,
your hand in perpetual motion
streams like chaos or unconscious fear,
strains to fill the fingers of a glove
while touching the railing.
And you in a puddle of course in a skirt shrunk by time,
you and Petya trapped in embroidery, in satin stitch, in a crooked frame,
like a faded sampler of Lenin with children.
I try to mend as I am told, like an obedient wife,
but the misprints and your endless cold
one way or another will make you sad. So
leave the gloves alone,
stop rubbing them, and I’ll leave
the river, the air and our loves in peace. Don’t touch the air with your hand
and I’ll stop being didactic. Then
force yourself to think: River. Don’t think: Water.
Don’t think of streams of ink or rescue boats or drinking.
You don’t even know what it is: to remember a river
that’s not an extended scream
that can’t be rolled up like a rug.
You can’t say: look how it twists and turns,
look how duck crumbs spill from trouser pockets
and signals of longing are caught by short waves
remember the river doesn’t stop, not for granite dust,
for gray hairs, for the petty battle
between lathered cheek and razor,
it’s not read aloud syllable by syllable
like an item about war in the newspaper,
not lined in brocade like a coffin,
not decorated with silver like the soldiers’ uniforms, not eyes
widening, not in magnifying glasses, not in waves
of boulders and flounces, not in voile, not in lace,
which is really silly,
to remember a river that’s not typed in italics, not scattered in composition.
Give my regards to Boris the turtle if you see him.
In any case you don’t know what it means
to look out of Titus’ city past the hills of Moab,
trying to remember, not the islands of dung piling up by the river,
carrying it toward the bay,
not the olive trees or the weeds, not the two river banks
at the same time, left and right,
not creased, not pleated,
to remember the river not with a shiny oil spill
around the meatball sailing from the direction of Kirov’s factory.
Approach the river, force yourself to think: River,
when you splash in the puddle without noticing the old man
fishing with the pair of silver arms
from his eyeglasses. Nota bene: Love old men for they are our future,
old women too. A pair of silver arms – that’s all I have left
to remind me of your husband, while trying to remember the river
as I look at the hills of Moab from the city of Titus
and of many others, left and righteous,
and mine, among them for the first time.
An Arab on a donkey passes below and I try
to remember not the donkey’s ass and not the olive trees
but rather the river:
not stopping, not long,
not dependent on words.
The Arab riding the donkey
moves through the scorched valley.
Second letter
Today I wanted to talk with you
about our imperfect walks
imperfect from the point of view of good taste
if you remember
we gave them
names – for example, the Friendship Rambles or the Wandering of the Reckless
and you condemned me when I cursed: “Damn it.”
rosy blotters from a math notebook fluttered in the air
spreading the scent of cheap perfume—Mademoiselle
de Scudery[1] – which smells like lime or flea soap.
And here the bougainvilleas have such varied shades
petals blue as veins, those in the photo
are called plumbago
and they are waiting for an unforgivable rhyme
I’d rather forget about the rhyme and meter
and the rest of the hellish matters
and not talk about fire or brimstone
end quote
and the beginning of the new one--
passiflora teaches each wall and fence the grammar of refinement/preciousness?,
turning them into flower stands, into a substitute for stands in the absence of standards
not retirees in knit gloves tending the flock of garden pots,
simply pay the Arab his money on time
how easy!
it isn’t exactly filigree
and afterwards without a witness, voyeur or neighbor
they enjoy the afternoon nap of the fawn
in the bitter orange grove
in the space of a square meter and no more
and whoever’s in a hurry adds luster--
each one to his own orange tree--
varnishes, polishes, and it’s greenish anyway
and returns exhausted to rest.
As long as a frustrated Young Pioneer carries a knapsack on her back
for good posture
as long as a toddler from October’s children scratches the asphalt with a sled
and the blue plumbago look out from eyes of folly
as long as the passiflora vines are pressed to the wall, hair turning silver
they hide the graying curls between the stones of Judea
arrange the veil lower on the forehead
grabbing the hat with paper passiflora
and already in the month of Iyar
everyone lifts a lace parasol
like a drawing of a lighthouse among waves of folklore
from the lycée
or from the Annenschule:
See how SEMICOLON is strutting with pride!
Into two or more parts he’ll a sentence divide.
After all not many opportunities
to remember patchouli
and a cluster of snowballs in a pitcher
and the game “Forfeits”
and collars with broderie anglaise--
exactly like the ones I used to have
made out of grandmother’s drawers
to be exact the drawers that were made into curtains
and to be reminded of eau de cologne again
for the unrefreshing rhymes
that never change
that have never changed since the lycée
or the Annenschule
where your parents studied, Nekoda’s father, my brother, Tamara Silman,
it seems to me, Admoni, Baron Tisenhausen,
Menaker, Katzenellenbogen and Donde
a donde? where to?
de donde? where from?
por donde? how?
Donde Regina
the nuisance and “don’t touch me”
chronic sore throat
Regina Samoilovna Donde showing off in her moth eaten fur
takes herself for a stroll and catches a cold again
and the Anneschule is buzzing:
In the dark alleyways—Isn’t it droll!
Katzenellenbogen kisses Donde in return for a roll.
Donde las dan, las toman.
a donde? whereto?
as long as the passiflora grant preciousness
to every hand rail that continues with their help
I swear to you I can forget even Leningrad--
remembering only the houses and thinking only about my brother
and because “grad” is no longer a city in Russian but rather “hail”
and as long as the passiflora steal upon the whitewash.
I don’t dare find them a place, not in the poems, and not between the lines
as long as the passiflora creep up the wall
I’m familiar with their whispering
not even sounds but signs of notes
hesitant attempts
like eyeliner smeared on a cheek
perhaps I’m too specific for nothing
but listen
you know—what is called “jasmine” here
isn’t jasmine but something completely different.
Not long ago I searched the book of plants?
and all I got for it was a headache
I didn’t even find a trace of what we call jasmine
or was it just the fragrance. I doubt it.
Third Letter
For a long time now I’ve written nothing but letters
to you, my brother, my mother, to Gleb, to Arnis
and Lily, also to Kanovich, to Bardanashvilli
and sometimes to Deuil-la-barre, to an unknown friend,
or my thoughts circle the square like an idyllic donkey
and perhaps like a heretic
or just circle the square
but you, don’t write to me...
I sent a letter recently to my father,
two even, and the second, with an official ribbon like a saddle strap coming loose,
and my father will lose them both: one at the university, the other in his jacket.
Perhaps I will prove useful yet
and write a guide “For Writers of Letters in Mummified Language”
dedicated to Frug[2]
or publish the perfect handbook
“For Writers of Letters in Murdered Dialect and Dead Jargon”
but Daddy will lose
them both. Perhaps he already did.
Yesterday or two days ago.
For a long time now I’ve written nothing but letters
in order to write at the start of every line--
listen, don’t you see, understand, know, look, try—
choking with every comma.
Along with the hand and pencil movement
in every single word, two, three
syllables remain
with a vowel that can’t be pronounced
like a piece of conversation between me and myself
on a topic neither of us is interested in
and it’s unclear to both of us
that each one at any price
tries to hide her indifference
produced because of some kind of glaucoma
the exfoliation of the sun’s glow
from the window and lattice work
and the chalk mountains.
Let’s catch a gecko
and paint our palms with henna
wrap them in torn lace
the way we wrap ourselves
in blindness
and admit our intentions
to protect them from the evil eye according to popular tradition.
A gecko is caught under a hot slab of Samarian stone in the Valley of Gehenna
and we’ll place it on the dull edge of a jar of dill pickles
where it will dwell forever outside the law
of our correspondence
that is, unilateral,
like that of King George Street with the dragon
or the chronicle of permanent indispositions
still unpublished
for example- of the same migraine
or the exchange of opinions that no one asked
or of the poem itself
that I’m afraid to finish
because for a long time now I’ve written nothing but letters
and for this reason it stretches out like a fight among hounds
on the trail of a fox.
That is, as long as the day rhymes
chasing after thoughts that haven’t been thought through to the end
like an argument in which the accuser gets away
and the excuses hang
in the air, so hot it blunts feeling,
and in which a spoon stands as in jam;
that’s also the reason that you
hear me gasping for breath on every page.
Fourth Letter
The war years of winter are coming.
Pushkin the Second
Inesa, my dear, be very wary.
V.I. Lenin, letter to I. Armand
Don’t call this time war or winter
don’t call this time. Be –I beg you my dear— wary,
beware when choosing definitions in the most patriarchal of all anarchies
a definition is worse than the swallow’s V-sign that doesn’t make a spring.
Don’t mention conscience here, go find a bastard for trial and sue
while mumbling about something connected to dust and ashes
go write this carrion down in a story of temporary summer in our time zone.
The view from the window sealed with dusky nylon reminds me of the moonstones
I struggled so long to remove from grandmother’s ring.
The real model of an ideal place is a house where there are things
to amuse a child.
At grandmother’s they were three:
her alarm clock that clucks to this day
as if adjusting false teeth every six-eighths of a beat
in a race after the sleepy minutes of an afternoon nap;
the conch shell lost while moving from one apartment to another. Father
pulled the shell from the bottom of the Pacific
Ocean because everything was so pacific at grandmother’s
and only the clock clucked.
But even so – all of these things are quiet,
milk with boiled sweets in the shapes of strange animals
as a snack after napping;
and there was a gingerbread house
that slowly disappeared
first the chimney fell and they said it was my fault and wasn’t
heard from again and after that the edges peeled off but I wasn’t beaten
and two hatpins and a pile of buttons remain from the gingerbread house
and the same ring with the opal mentioned above.
Afterwards it fell but did not break, only the steps broke
on which Hansel and Gretel’s grandmother went out to greet the guns
with origami flowers.
Don’t call it war or winter
don’t say: God--
it won’t do any good
in any case be curious and scout the territory from the window
with this sweaty nylon
this territory commanded to lost tribes
to the tribe of Menashe if I remember correctly and someone else who didn’t return from captivity.
Perhaps it’s not flattering yet without prejudice
you saw the reflection of the moon in the Moab desert and even closer
the reflection of lunar stains
everything is rather flat and clean
like the Procrustean bed after death
whose sheets rustle and grow cold
the liquid
between the glass and the nylon
a stale mixture of rain dust and breaths
brings up between stalactites and stalagmites (and other mute and anonymous shapes)
what we’d forgotten
the drunken
popular tears of Yelena and Olga
and the cry of insult like a poplar in the flurry and feathers of pogroms.
Vast distances that aren’t subject to the eye
between the war and winter between winter and gas mask
absolutely no man’s knowledge cannot admit no man’s lands
those between the glass and the strips of nylon not to mention the Gaza Strip
and then recalling one distractedly
the water heater and unwashed gauze diapers
hung to dry like flags of surrendering national consciousness.
Don’t call this time.
[1] Madeleine de Scudery
(1607-1701) a French novelist , founder of the “Precieuse” society of French
writers
[2] Shimon-Shmuel Frug (1860-1916),
a Jewish poet, lived in Odessa and wrote in Russian and Yiddish.
translated from the Hebrew by Lisa Katz
Letters to Ona
First Letter
You don’t even know what it is: to remember a river,
approach, force yourself to think: River.
What did you see? A Greek in a creek from a children’s song and many names of bridges,
your hand in perpetual motion
streams like chaos or unconscious fear,
strains to fill the fingers of a glove
while touching the railing.
And you in a puddle of course in a skirt shrunk by time,
you and Petya trapped in embroidery, in satin stitch, in a crooked frame,
like a faded sampler of Lenin with children.
I try to mend as I am told, like an obedient wife,
but the misprints and your endless cold
one way or another will make you sad. So
leave the gloves alone,
stop rubbing them, and I’ll leave
the river, the air and our loves in peace. Don’t touch the air with your hand
and I’ll stop being didactic. Then
force yourself to think: River. Don’t think: Water.
Don’t think of streams of ink or rescue boats or drinking.
You don’t even know what it is: to remember a river
that’s not an extended scream
that can’t be rolled up like a rug.
You can’t say: look how it twists and turns,
look how duck crumbs spill from trouser pockets
and signals of longing are caught by short waves
remember the river doesn’t stop, not for granite dust,
for gray hairs, for the petty battle
between lathered cheek and razor,
it’s not read aloud syllable by syllable
like an item about war in the newspaper,
not lined in brocade like a coffin,
not decorated with silver like the soldiers’ uniforms, not eyes
widening, not in magnifying glasses, not in waves
of boulders and flounces, not in voile, not in lace,
which is really silly,
to remember a river that’s not typed in italics, not scattered in composition.
Give my regards to Boris the turtle if you see him.
In any case you don’t know what it means
to look out of Titus’ city past the hills of Moab,
trying to remember, not the islands of dung piling up by the river,
carrying it toward the bay,
not the olive trees or the weeds, not the two river banks
at the same time, left and right,
not creased, not pleated,
to remember the river not with a shiny oil spill
around the meatball sailing from the direction of Kirov’s factory.
Approach the river, force yourself to think: River,
when you splash in the puddle without noticing the old man
fishing with the pair of silver arms
from his eyeglasses. Nota bene: Love old men for they are our future,
old women too. A pair of silver arms – that’s all I have left
to remind me of your husband, while trying to remember the river
as I look at the hills of Moab from the city of Titus
and of many others, left and righteous,
and mine, among them for the first time.
An Arab on a donkey passes below and I try
to remember not the donkey’s ass and not the olive trees
but rather the river:
not stopping, not long,
not dependent on words.
The Arab riding the donkey
moves through the scorched valley.
Second letter
Today I wanted to talk with you
about our imperfect walks
imperfect from the point of view of good taste
if you remember
we gave them
names – for example, the Friendship Rambles or the Wandering of the Reckless
and you condemned me when I cursed: “Damn it.”
rosy blotters from a math notebook fluttered in the air
spreading the scent of cheap perfume—Mademoiselle
de Scudery[1] – which smells like lime or flea soap.
And here the bougainvilleas have such varied shades
petals blue as veins, those in the photo
are called plumbago
and they are waiting for an unforgivable rhyme
I’d rather forget about the rhyme and meter
and the rest of the hellish matters
and not talk about fire or brimstone
end quote
and the beginning of the new one--
passiflora teaches each wall and fence the grammar of refinement/preciousness?,
turning them into flower stands, into a substitute for stands in the absence of standards
not retirees in knit gloves tending the flock of garden pots,
simply pay the Arab his money on time
how easy!
it isn’t exactly filigree
and afterwards without a witness, voyeur or neighbor
they enjoy the afternoon nap of the fawn
in the bitter orange grove
in the space of a square meter and no more
and whoever’s in a hurry adds luster--
each one to his own orange tree--
varnishes, polishes, and it’s greenish anyway
and returns exhausted to rest.
As long as a frustrated Young Pioneer carries a knapsack on her back
for good posture
as long as a toddler from October’s children scratches the asphalt with a sled
and the blue plumbago look out from eyes of folly
as long as the passiflora vines are pressed to the wall, hair turning silver
they hide the graying curls between the stones of Judea
arrange the veil lower on the forehead
grabbing the hat with paper passiflora
and already in the month of Iyar
everyone lifts a lace parasol
like a drawing of a lighthouse among waves of folklore
from the lycée
or from the Annenschule:
See how SEMICOLON is strutting with pride!
Into two or more parts he’ll a sentence divide.
After all not many opportunities
to remember patchouli
and a cluster of snowballs in a pitcher
and the game “Forfeits”
and collars with broderie anglaise--
exactly like the ones I used to have
made out of grandmother’s drawers
to be exact the drawers that were made into curtains
and to be reminded of eau de cologne again
for the unrefreshing rhymes
that never change
that have never changed since the lycée
or the Annenschule
where your parents studied, Nekoda’s father, my brother, Tamara Silman,
it seems to me, Admoni, Baron Tisenhausen,
Menaker, Katzenellenbogen and Donde
a donde? where to?
de donde? where from?
por donde? how?
Donde Regina
the nuisance and “don’t touch me”
chronic sore throat
Regina Samoilovna Donde showing off in her moth eaten fur
takes herself for a stroll and catches a cold again
and the Anneschule is buzzing:
In the dark alleyways—Isn’t it droll!
Katzenellenbogen kisses Donde in return for a roll.
Donde las dan, las toman.
a donde? whereto?
as long as the passiflora grant preciousness
to every hand rail that continues with their help
I swear to you I can forget even Leningrad--
remembering only the houses and thinking only about my brother
and because “grad” is no longer a city in Russian but rather “hail”
and as long as the passiflora steal upon the whitewash.
I don’t dare find them a place, not in the poems, and not between the lines
as long as the passiflora creep up the wall
I’m familiar with their whispering
not even sounds but signs of notes
hesitant attempts
like eyeliner smeared on a cheek
perhaps I’m too specific for nothing
but listen
you know—what is called “jasmine” here
isn’t jasmine but something completely different.
Not long ago I searched the book of plants?
and all I got for it was a headache
I didn’t even find a trace of what we call jasmine
or was it just the fragrance. I doubt it.
Third Letter
For a long time now I’ve written nothing but letters
to you, my brother, my mother, to Gleb, to Arnis
and Lily, also to Kanovich, to Bardanashvilli
and sometimes to Deuil-la-barre, to an unknown friend,
or my thoughts circle the square like an idyllic donkey
and perhaps like a heretic
or just circle the square
but you, don’t write to me...
I sent a letter recently to my father,
two even, and the second, with an official ribbon like a saddle strap coming loose,
and my father will lose them both: one at the university, the other in his jacket.
Perhaps I will prove useful yet
and write a guide “For Writers of Letters in Mummified Language”
dedicated to Frug[2]
or publish the perfect handbook
“For Writers of Letters in Murdered Dialect and Dead Jargon”
but Daddy will lose
them both. Perhaps he already did.
Yesterday or two days ago.
For a long time now I’ve written nothing but letters
in order to write at the start of every line--
listen, don’t you see, understand, know, look, try—
choking with every comma.
Along with the hand and pencil movement
in every single word, two, three
syllables remain
with a vowel that can’t be pronounced
like a piece of conversation between me and myself
on a topic neither of us is interested in
and it’s unclear to both of us
that each one at any price
tries to hide her indifference
produced because of some kind of glaucoma
the exfoliation of the sun’s glow
from the window and lattice work
and the chalk mountains.
Let’s catch a gecko
and paint our palms with henna
wrap them in torn lace
the way we wrap ourselves
in blindness
and admit our intentions
to protect them from the evil eye according to popular tradition.
A gecko is caught under a hot slab of Samarian stone in the Valley of Gehenna
and we’ll place it on the dull edge of a jar of dill pickles
where it will dwell forever outside the law
of our correspondence
that is, unilateral,
like that of King George Street with the dragon
or the chronicle of permanent indispositions
still unpublished
for example- of the same migraine
or the exchange of opinions that no one asked
or of the poem itself
that I’m afraid to finish
because for a long time now I’ve written nothing but letters
and for this reason it stretches out like a fight among hounds
on the trail of a fox.
That is, as long as the day rhymes
chasing after thoughts that haven’t been thought through to the end
like an argument in which the accuser gets away
and the excuses hang
in the air, so hot it blunts feeling,
and in which a spoon stands as in jam;
that’s also the reason that you
hear me gasping for breath on every page.
Fourth Letter
The war years of winter are coming.
Pushkin the Second
Inesa, my dear, be very wary.
V.I. Lenin, letter to I. Armand
Don’t call this time war or winter
don’t call this time. Be –I beg you my dear— wary,
beware when choosing definitions in the most patriarchal of all anarchies
a definition is worse than the swallow’s V-sign that doesn’t make a spring.
Don’t mention conscience here, go find a bastard for trial and sue
while mumbling about something connected to dust and ashes
go write this carrion down in a story of temporary summer in our time zone.
The view from the window sealed with dusky nylon reminds me of the moonstones
I struggled so long to remove from grandmother’s ring.
The real model of an ideal place is a house where there are things
to amuse a child.
At grandmother’s they were three:
her alarm clock that clucks to this day
as if adjusting false teeth every six-eighths of a beat
in a race after the sleepy minutes of an afternoon nap;
the conch shell lost while moving from one apartment to another. Father
pulled the shell from the bottom of the Pacific
Ocean because everything was so pacific at grandmother’s
and only the clock clucked.
But even so – all of these things are quiet,
milk with boiled sweets in the shapes of strange animals
as a snack after napping;
and there was a gingerbread house
that slowly disappeared
first the chimney fell and they said it was my fault and wasn’t
heard from again and after that the edges peeled off but I wasn’t beaten
and two hatpins and a pile of buttons remain from the gingerbread house
and the same ring with the opal mentioned above.
Afterwards it fell but did not break, only the steps broke
on which Hansel and Gretel’s grandmother went out to greet the guns
with origami flowers.
Don’t call it war or winter
don’t say: God--
it won’t do any good
in any case be curious and scout the territory from the window
with this sweaty nylon
this territory commanded to lost tribes
to the tribe of Menashe if I remember correctly and someone else who didn’t return from captivity.
Perhaps it’s not flattering yet without prejudice
you saw the reflection of the moon in the Moab desert and even closer
the reflection of lunar stains
everything is rather flat and clean
like the Procrustean bed after death
whose sheets rustle and grow cold
the liquid
between the glass and the nylon
a stale mixture of rain dust and breaths
brings up between stalactites and stalagmites (and other mute and anonymous shapes)
what we’d forgotten
the drunken
popular tears of Yelena and Olga
and the cry of insult like a poplar in the flurry and feathers of pogroms.
Vast distances that aren’t subject to the eye
between the war and winter between winter and gas mask
absolutely no man’s knowledge cannot admit no man’s lands
those between the glass and the strips of nylon not to mention the Gaza Strip
and then recalling one distractedly
the water heater and unwashed gauze diapers
hung to dry like flags of surrendering national consciousness.
Don’t call this time.
[1] Madeleine de Scudery
(1607-1701) a French novelist , founder of the “Precieuse” society of French
writers
[2] Shimon-Shmuel Frug (1860-1916),
a Jewish poet, lived in Odessa and wrote in Russian and Yiddish.