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 Another Place, A Foreign City | Maya Arad
(English Translation by the author)
© Xargol Books Ltd., Tel Aviv. It is forbidden to copy, duplicate, photograph, record, translate, store in a data base, or distribute this/these works or any part of them in any form or by any electrical, digital, optical or mechanical means without written permission from the copyright holder.
Achad Ha-Am! Damnation!
A mystery of which and why?
He's bumped into that name already -
That's much he'll swear on, to be sure.
It's biblical, that's clear. But who?
He doesn't have the slightest clue.
Would wish to ask - but better not.
This must be clarified today!
(Blessed be the landlady:
Before her going - high time too -
To settle in her nursing home,
She left behind a bygone gift
Next to the staircase switchboard:
"My First Encyclopedia").
The saying goes - that I were Rothschild…
Like street, like man:
That, is the prettiest boulevard,
This, so to speak: One of the People.
A certain thrift rules everywhere:
They cut concrete, they cut cement,
They cut on color, they cut space,
To cut it short: they cut it short.
Right and left, the paint is peeling,
From balconies, encased in shutters:
Here is laundry, hung for drying,
Here a rug, unfurled for airing,
Here, nylon-wrapped, a banner
Proclaims: "The Nation with the Golan".
*
But she would still insist,
Identity and not religion,
This is exactly what she's after:
The flag and not the Talith.
Professor Etz is crimson red.
The wand he has conducted with
Is now descended like a mace:
"Not religion, madam. Culture!
Allow me this: aye, there's the rub,
Precipitance and youthfulness,
Not to deny, ignorance even!
You - there's the root of all evil -
Roll everything higgedly-piggedly:
Would not distinguish culture and religion!
"What is the virtue of our literature,
Whereto respect is due,
Without the jewel of our crown,
To wit, the Holy Book!
For Modern Hebrew is
A drop of froth upon the water,
A tear unique, a lonely sparkle
Against the oceans of the Talmud!
Solomon's riches", he clasps his hands,
"No end, the treasures they contain:
Spain's poetry, and Maimonides,
The chosen fruit of two millennia,
Of generations of creation:
Religion? Culture! There's the rub!"
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