iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 14/10/2026

I haven’t really gotten around to revising my first pass over *In Treblinke* for a few reasons — one is because it had me out of sorts for a very long time after the first run.

I Hear A Voice

The sun rose over a mountain of the murdered
And someone who saw it asked:
— How are you not ashamed to rise, sun?
He asked and got no reply,
Because at the same moment he said to himself:
— How are you not ashamed to keep living?
And he sat down opposite the mountain
And looked at the bodies as they lay
Some with faces down to the ground
And some with faces up to the sun.
And again he asked:
— How are you not ashamed to look at the sun?
And at the same moment he said to himself:
— How are you not ashamed to sit when all of them lie?
And he lay down, like one of the dead,
Face up, and lay for hours.
And lying there, a song came to him
About his own shame,
And the song began to sing out of him,
And he stood up
And allowed the tune to carry
And the mountain of murdered
Took up his song
And answered with an echo
Like a resounding choir.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 12/10/2026

גלאזגאָ איז גלאזגאָ איז גלאזגאָ…

The new statue of Nelson Mandela has been crowned

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

It’s time again for what seems like another bi-monthly translator’s day, and while I am not a translator, here is a poem originally published in Tsukunft in 1915 under a different title.

Night and Rain

Night and rain. All the beasts
Sleep in their cages,
Only the quick squirrel
Leaps from branch to branch.

All the benches and huts empty,
All the paths — wet;
The homeless from the street
Come to find hiding places.

One sits on a bench
And rain pours from his face,
His hands — only just
Raked through the garbage.

His dead eyes look off somewhere,
As if through bars,
And a piece of bread falls
From his breast to the grass….

Night and sorrow. A drizzle falls
From the trees
And with a violent start from sleep
The lion leaps…

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Melekh Ravitch wrecking me today for a change.

Farewell Chava, my childhood pain,
First love and love’s terror,
You left not only me
But our people too.

May life, this strange one, be good to you,
Perhaps what happened had to,
May your sons only see the mother in your face
And never the Jew…

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

So the book I finally got my grubby little hands on was Israel Efros’s account of visiting the DP camps in Germany, and which has this page that first appear in the scanned version

A red and black pages saying ‘remember 6000000’ in Yiddish and Hebrew

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Noah Steinberg quotes him as saying ‘‘I still can’t believe that I, who sit in a warm house, at a fine table, and speak with you, was there. Now it all has the air of a terrible legend to me.’ Those other selves often populate his poems, such as this one from 1919’s Lieder.

Bricked Up Windows

The windows bricked up,
The walls freezing;
A lamp hangs by the door,
Barely, barely burning.

I lie under the cover
Of grey cloth,
And gaze at a single point
On the opposite wall.

Everything forgotten now,
I am far away from myself;
Who knows, perhaps
I have long since been freed?..

And perhaps
I am dead and the lamp
By the door burns yahrzeit,
Burns yahrzeit for me?

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

I would have posted the essay from Leivick about his own childhood (and adult) concept of Yom Kippur and judgement, but instead here’s David Opatoshu writing about Yom Kippur from New Guinea, where he was stationed.

Yes, Yom Kippur approaches. My third Yom Kippur in the Army, and every year I’ve written you a Yom Kippur letter. The first year from Camp Dix, the second year from the Oregon desert, and this year from New Guinea. For me, it’s a mightily important holiday. I am stunned by what a great ethic we Jews possess. Firmly-fixed days when people must bare themselves, examine themselves, must see the ugliness they carry within themselves. And I, as a young Jewish man of the twentieth century, can adopt this in my fashion. Fit the holiday to myself. Thinking in this self-reflective frame of mind, the imagination soars:

‘…He lies in a pit. A pit he dug with his own hands. With tooth and nail, sweat and saliva, he cut, tore clumps of heavy jungle dirt. Hands and elbows, knees and back, dug into the sopping jungle dirt. With stomach cramps and burning lungs, he curled up and remained lying in his foxhole. He closed his eyes.

‘When was it? How long ago? An hour? A minute? Or the day before? There is no today, no yesterday and no tomorrow. This moment, nothing more, now he lies in the pit. The cold steel muzzle of his rifle rests on the edge of the pit. And his eyes struggle over the rifle. Eyes — opened wide, with a forceful jerk, want to pierce, cut through the black wall of the jungle night. There, somewhere in the dark of the jungle — not far away — lies the enemy. There, in the bowels of the jungle, behind the gnawed roots of a primeval tree, a pair of eyes strain towards him through hot fog that rises from the wet jungle earth.

‘What’s there? A shadow? It moves. Shoot? And if it is a shadow? Shooting would reveal my hiding place. A rustle! Right? Left? Lie down. Be quiet. Calm. Be cool. Like they taught you. Wait, wait. Hold the rifle tighter; like that, like that. You see? It’s nothing, just your imagination. Wipe the cold sweat from your forehead. Loosen your belt. It’ll ease those stomach cramps that won’t let up.

‘How long the night is. There isn’t any end to the days-long darkness, night is full of terror and fear. Night is full of knife-blades and hot lead and stabbing, shooting, tearing, squealing of torn-open mouths when the blood starts to spurt! gushing from pieced flesh. This is the night.

‘He lies in his foxhole in the depths of the jungle frontline of the war. It’s night — the night of Yom Kippur. He sees his grandfather, with flaming red beard, and grandfather, wrapped in his tallis, floats and sways. And he, a little boy, stands nearby and watches, rapt. And the grandfather takes his grandson and wraps him in his tallis, as well. The boy stands swaddled in the darkness, holding fast to his grandfather’s tallis. And a scent comes from the tallis, like of yellowed pages in an old prayer book. And the boy is well now, warm. Now he is protected by the tears of generations.

‘Huh? Did you fall asleep? What’s wrong with you? Do you want to kiss your life goodbye? Sleeping? Now? Keep you eyes open. Feel how hard the rifle it. Go on, count the stars. One, two, three, four. A sky full of stars. As though the sky has been ploughed and sown thickly with star-seeds. And the stars wink, sparkle, flicker — not stars, but the burning candles by the holy ark. And high above it — broad palm leaves start to sway and whisper. Not palm leaves — it’s grandfather’s tallis that whispers, cooly stroking his cheek. Grandfather strikes himself, writhing in anguish, gives an accounting of his soul. And him? Him, too. He ought to give an accounting of himself, as well. Who? Him? An accounting? Why? For whom? Not him. No Jew must give an accounting today. Past generations have given reckoning enough of their own sins. The reckoning of a thousand centuries stands read for the world to see. Numbers which were multiplied countless times in tears, in blood, in the flames of pyres. The world must now give an accounting. To him — the Jew — there must be given a reckoning,

and the accounting laid at his feet. He’d washed his soul clean when he took rifle in hand. He’s settled his own accounts when he went into battle to fight against the murder of millions, to fight for a free world. And now the world must give him an accounting. He — Jew, soldier, man of the word — is too big in its eyes. In his own ranks, in the body of the soldier who lay not far from him, who must now be his brother, was rooted a deep hatred for him. Four enumerated freedoms, heralded across the world. A dream, a hope, a certainty when victory came. They now fought for those four freedoms, life or death, and in his own ranks, the words were merely paper, although the rifle that he koshered with the blood of murderers and the fight for freedom, also made his own ranks kosher. He has given his reply to the world. Now the world needs to answer to him. Strike yourself in the breast with a fist, world, tremble in the hours of Yom Kippur, and give and accounting! Give an accounting!

‘He grabs the rifle. A shadow slips, snaking quietly across the jungle. Aiming slowly, calmly and coolly, aiming right at the middle of the shadowy form. Slowly squeezing the trigger, harder and harder and…the crack of a bullet, a spurt from the muzzle, a burst of powder and flame. Night again, Silent in the jungle. Crickets chirping, palms whispering. He lies in his foxhole and waits for an answer. Waits for an accounting…’

This, my dearest, is how I imagine Yom Kippur of 1944. Whether on an island in the Pacific, on French soil, or in a foxhole in Poland or Romania, Jewish soldiers lie and fight, falling in the battle for freedom. Will victory also bring them freedom? Will blood wash away peoples’ hatred of Jews? Will tomorrow be ours as well? So many doubts, so much sorrow

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

Ah, my Batman picture never posted.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

Lino cut by David Gander

Winnie the Pooh and Satan contemplating peeing through a fascist neighbour’s letterbox. As one surely does.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

Ok, right, I’m done with this week now.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

Rokhl Korn was the highlight of my day today. Pissing down, but at least there was a poem or two.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

There is something really delightful in living in a place everyone hates!

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 30/07/2026

One thing I love is that no one outside of Yiddish knows how to parse Leivick’s name. I’ve seen everything from Haim to Henrik. Oh, and here’s Leonard Bernstein, too.

A black and white picture of three men in academic mortarboards. Leonard Bernstein and H. Leivick getting honorary doctorates from Hebrew Union College in 1958.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

A short poem from In Treblinke bin ikh not geven, translated quite literally. I like the idea of the gaze here; can Jews be viewed clearly, or is it always through a haze of gas and ash now? Can we see the world any other way but through that mediating veil? Can we even see ourselves clearly?

Don’t Look at Me That Way

Don’t look at me that way, through clear windows,
Look at me through fences, smoke and flames,
Through walls with spikes and chimney stacks
Of hellish ovens and through poison gas.

Clouds are pulled down from above
And lie piled in dense heaps,
Bolts of ghetto-songs shoot into them,
The words of a burned Majdanek poet.

I don’t know how to go on living,
And how to answer to all the martyrs;
Guilty against all those slain like warriors,
And still more — all those killed like lambs.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 14/06/2026

Now just imagine that your office mate sends you, a recent import to the UK, to get ‘Elevenses’. And you come back with an assortment of biscuits and chocolates to have with tea and she is pissed off because she wanted an actual ‘Elevenses’

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 14/06/2026

I’ll likely never get to YIVO and they have no truck with me, but this week they’ve been asking for photos of brides who may have worn a wedding dress made from a Luftwaffe parachute at Belsen DP camp on behalf of some documentary makers, and it reminded me of this poem.

Wedding Dresses in a Camp

Seven wedding dresses
Hanging on rack.
One not short — not shorter,
One not long — not longer.

Seven bridal dresses —
Camp possessions,
For its daughter’s processions,
For its mother’s processions.

Seven wedding dresses
White as moons,
For the people’s orphans,
For the people’s widows.

Seven bridal dresses —
Musicians play for them,
To soothe their whiteness,
To quiet their pain.

Seven wedding dresses
Dancing camp shers,
So the people of Israel
Might grow and increase.

Seven bridal dresses
Fluttering in horas,
Mocking the bunkers,
Death by gas, crematoria.

Seven bridal dresses
Sleeping on the rack,
Dreaming and smiling
At the chuppah-bringer.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 09/05/2026

What I love is that he’s noted as an essayist on the card. Which is a really kind of ‘lost’ facet of his career (I don’t really hold by ‘lost‘ writers, the same guys are brought up every few years). It’s the bit that intrigues me the most after all this.

The text from a Yiddish trading card of H. Leivick

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 07/05/2026

Arrived in Rio. Don’t know if the articles go on. Don’t know if I will know. But here’s a picture from Brazil, borrowed from…I think the Wexler Oral history facebook?

Leivick in Brazil, serious as always. A nice white suit.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 02/05/2026

So I shared ‘First of May 1935’ which, in the book, is contrasted with a May Day in Russia, but there’s another twist on that specific poem from 1935 which appears in 1946 in a chapter about Feldafing DP camp and it’s strong Bundist faction

I return to the depths of the crowd — a second man approaches me:

“Pardon me,” he says,” I want to ask you something. But before I ask, I want to tell you something. This year on the First of May, we had two First of May demonstrations in the camp. One demonstration was carried out by the Bund, the Communists and the Leftist Poale-Zion; The second demonstration, by the Zionist organisation, Hashomer Hatzair, and the partisan collective, Haoved. Both demonstrations happened at the same time, at ten in the morning, in two separate places. Around a thousand people took part in the first demonstration; around seven hundred in the other. You’ll probably ask why you need to hold two demonstrations in the same camp?

“Why can’t a Jewish DP camp, who eats the same UNRRA bread and the same sour soup from the same bowl, make the First of May one united celebration? The First of May is a holiday of unity, of brotherhood, particularly here, in a camp of KZniks, who Hitler whipped with the same knout and burned in the same crematoria fires. I ask you. And don’t forget that it’s scarcely a year since the liberation. Hitler’s lashes are still hot on our bodies, and his numbers still smoulder on our arms. How has this come about, you’ll ask. I’ll tell you: The reason there couldn't be one united demonstration lies — do you know in what? In the flags. Better to say: In the Jewish flag. Even better to say: In the blue and white flag. Do you understand? The Bund, the Communists and the Leftist Poale-Zion wanted the red flag to be carried at the demonstration and nothing else. The other side wanted to carry the blue and white flag as well as the red flag. The first side argued that even in Eretz Yisroel, only the red flag is carried on the First of May, because the First of May is a completely Socialist, not a Nationalist, holiday; the other side, however, argued back that even if that was the case, it wanted to raise the Jewish flag at every holiday precisely because we’re in a camp

“So, you understand, because of such an exacting treyf-and-kosher question, the state of unity did not arrive. The rabbinical authorities couldn’t reach to a consensus; the first side could not, by any means, be convinced to enter in such treyf-ness, Lord have mercy on us. It remained for two demonstrations to be made and for each side to separately celebrate and observe the holiday of unity. That’s the story. Now I want to ask you what you have say to this? What do you feel about the sort of unity that must be celebrated separately?”

The man sets his sharp face, and I see in his whole carriage how everything that he is comes out as he tells me the story. He doesn’t wait for my answer, because he clearly knows what sort of answer there can be to this.

Indeed, I tell him:

“I can’t, of course, be certain that everything was exactly as you describe, but it’s completely typical of our lives. I don’t need to give you any answer, because you’ve already given the answer yourself. But thank you for telling me the story anyhow.”

Walking by myself afterward, a poem of mine comes to mind, ‘First of May, 1935,’ which begins with the lines:

In Union Square march the Communists,
On Fifth Avenue march the Socialists,
And between both groups — mounted police…

I take these lines now and transform them myself, alter them:

On one side of the camp marches the red flag,
On the other side — the blue and white flag,
And between the both — with a black flag,
March six million martyrs.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

Here’s my old rough draft, more than a few infelicities. He wrote a play about Lekert, too — He clearly occupied a huge bit of his imagination. And then he draws a straight line between Lekert and American lynchings, which I think is very interesting and slightly overlooked.

First of May — New York, 1935

In Union Square march the Communists,
On Fifth Avenue march the Socialists. —
And between both camps — mounted police.
The riders have an order — alas! —
To mind that the proletarian legions
Should not throw themselves upon each other’s flags,
And should not, in an outbreak of brotherly fighting,
Bloody the holiday-time streets.
For today the First of Ma — the holiday of brothers,
Of solidarity and International songs,
The day of red blossoms and wondrous liberation —
Hence and therefore, they march separately!

In Union Square march the Communists,
On Fifth Avenue march the Socialists,
And between both camps — mounted police
To stop them from falling upon one another —
Because the First of May, you see, is come today
A day when the weak unburden their anger
On those as weak, as helpless, as themselves,
On their own blood and bone —
Because the First of May is no longer beautiful May.
It lies on all the squares like lead,
And laments beneath the tread of those who march,
And strikes at the ankles of their leaders in grief;
Because hate instead of brotherhood has been planted
In the heart of the worker, to hate the worker unto death
All the days of the year. Therefore they march separately,
With collective contempt for one another.

In Union Square march the Communists,
On Fifth Avenue march the Socialists,
And between them — to avoid a brother-slaughter —
The police — alas! — stand guard and watch —
For today is the First of May, the day of red banners,
The day of brotherhood and hope for change,
The day of ‘Proletarians of all countries, unite.’
The day of singing out the song select —
Hence and therefore, it seems, they march divided.

…And on a nearby streetcorner, in the shadows of a cold wall,
O, see — what a man! Known and unknown;
He stands alone and throws up his arms,
It seems that he will soon collapse,
And strike his head again the hard stones,
And he froths and foams at the mouth. —
O, see, it is Hirsh Lekert there — the gallows-knight.
The plaintiff and the debt-collector, for the whipping of the rider,
Hirsh Lekert of the Villa shoemakers.
Anointed warrior of the legendary First of May…
O, Hirsh Lekert, cobbler-youth so dear to me,
Why stands on the fringes and gasp in a fever,
And pass unnoticed, a shadow by a mute wall,
And wring your limp hands?
And turn your neck in all directions,
And begin to howl from your hollow cheeks —
Do you weep or, perhaps, laugh?
And, see, I forget to ask: is it a dream or reality?
Do I really, in truth, see your gleaming eyes?
And who has taken you down from the gallows?
And who has brought you here from Vilna,
To Hester Street, in New York, and Union Square,
To shuffle along, a stranger, by the wall,
To be noticed by none, recognised by none,
And to behold only all the shame and baseness
Of your heirs — enemies instead of brothers,
They that speak — speak so prettily and smoothly,
And name your spring-time deed,
And name your May-time hanging
And who go — they go, warring, past you.

In Union Square march the Communists,
On Fifth Avenue march the Socialists,
You look and see the swaying of the red flags,
And you ask: What stirs more, flag or civil war?
O, Hirsh Lekert, so dear to me,
Bury all your questions deep inside yourself,
For see, there still hang, even now,
The Haymarket Martyrs, Spies and Parsons and Engel,
And Lingg and Fischer — the gallows-ropes
That strangled their throats fifty years back,
Are as taut as they ever were, and their shadows,
Which sway now across each flag,
Are unseen by any. Each engrossed in themselves.
The sword of destruction comes upon all the earth,
And only the strength of unity can stop the sword,
Only each is cur…

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

First of May — New York, 1935 In Union Square march the Communists, On Fifth Avenue march the Socialists, And between both camps — mounted police. (And boy is the unquiet ghost of Hirsh Lekert disappointed)

A very long Yiddish poem about the divisions between the socialists and communists in New York, and how the police have to keep them from tearing each other apart on May Day in 1935 that evokes the political actions and events of May Days past.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 23/04/2026

Party at my house growing up

Gefilte fish, ginger ale and sherbet. Tonight we feast like slightly lactose-intolerant kings.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 23/04/2026

More election twaddle. Missing the ’Reform Party’ one that I shredded and messaged someone that ‘as an immigrant, I’d like to deport Nigel Farrage’ about.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 22/04/2026

The letter to his mother is a very different affair, in which he (very unsubtly) tries to evade telling her about the real state of the world:

‘Do you know, Mother, what happens to us today
Here in this world,
In the days of a Majdanek, a Treblinka,
In days of…oh, forgive me,
I’ve said this to you for no reason at all.
Because in truth the world is very well today
And very peaceful. Yes, yes. No pain, no murder.
The sheep lives together with the wolf
Just like it says in Isaiah —
Yes, yes — just like it says in Isaiah.
The people live happily and satisfied with each other,
In all the corners of the world.
Just like it says in Isaiah. Yes, yes.
The land of our people drips with red honey,
With sticky-sweet, wonderful honey.
All the nations surround it with mercy and love
And throw whole suns beneath their feet.
On all the trees hang their stars of David,
In all the fields lie their Torah scrolls,
And on the Torah scrolls — man, wife and child
In all sorts of forms, sleep sweetly and peacefully.
In peace, just like it says in Isaiah,
Yes, yes, as it says in Isaiah,
Yes, yes, in absolute peace.
None of them moves a muscle,
And no sob or moan is heard from any,
They lie still. They all lie very still.
There is peace amongst them, Mother, forever and ever.
And I, your son, also benefit from it:
In all the attics, in all the deep cellars,
My poems grow in tall, plentiful heaps,
And good winds come from all directions,
Streaming into the attics and cellars,
And there’s such a frolicking of wind and word —
Such dancing, hurling, plucking,
Until the revelling, dancing winds
Get bored of playing and race off.
It becomes still again in all the attics,
In all the cellars — because it’s peace, Mother.
It’s peace over all the earth, great peace.’

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 22/04/2026

Yay, another caricature! I have a modest collection now.

A little cartoon of H. Leivick, which is rather charming, from a Hebrew paper. It is quite possibly the best caricature in that it doesn’t make him look like Gary Oldman in Dracula.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 22/04/2026

So my crackpot musing about getting ‘Emil and Karl’ on the curriculum here (I’d be happy for anything by a Jewish writer. Or anything, really, by not-John Boyne) was spurred by a lovely little review. Translation in alt text

And here is a letter, a reception of my book Emil and Karl, which is dated and belongs to that period when Leivick was in a celebratory mood because of the commemorative publication of his collected poems:

3 April, 1940

My dear Glatshteyn, thank you for the book ‘Emil and Karl.’ I have read it in a single gulp.

You will certainly, and most of all, be interested in the critique of my Shmuel (12 years old). He read the book with tears in his eyes, and when he had finished, he threw himself on his mother and said: It’s good to have a mother who feeds you and puts you to bed.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 10/04/2026

It’s also the home of my Leyvik House postcard most of the time (Portrait here by Enrico Glicenstein)

A postcard for the dedication of Leyvik House in Tel Aviv in 1970

A double portrait of H.Leivick, probably in charcoal, by Glicenstein.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 10/04/2026

Benn isn’t really a favourite artist of mine, but I do like the section dividers (here for part 2, ‘The flag with seven stars’ — a reference to the flag of the ZIM ships, which used to have a passenger service to Israel)

An open book with pen and ink style illustrations. The Fey of ‘fon’ is elongated into a flag.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 06/04/2026

Where I’m at just now

A very pretty two-colour title page and a Yiddish dictionary that is he,d together with gorilla tape and prayer

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

I was not in Treblinka continues a bit like a full-body scourging. Today we see a bit of the newspaper-man (well, the ad man, at least, with his ad-copy, and the lurid news photographer a la WeeGee) in Leivick to go with the grief and bitterness. He’s always good at getting a sarcastic poke in.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

I’ve been digging away at the other ‘separating the art from the artist’ pieces. The one from *after^ the war is a belter. But this is pretty good (Though rough draft, alt text slightly abridged)

Writers who are Nazis today. Writers who give their approval to the destruction of our people today. It deals with Hamsun today. And it deals with Wagner, because although he is no longer living himself, and doesn’t directly take part in Hitler’s atrocities, Wagner’s outspoken
hatred towards us is exploited by Hitler. He serves Hitler as an inspiration. He serves Hitler as though he were a living, active influence.
I argue: and what if Hamsun’s novels and Wagner’s music give much joy and pleasure? Well, so what? Reject that pleasure! Where is it written that you must have every pleasure?
According to Tsebion, it appears that when one rejects writers like Hamsun, we start down the path of the Nazis. I don’t understand how such a conclusion can be made. We do someone the same harm, then? We only want to be able to do without the work of writers who become Nazis. That’s all. We don’t want to receive any pleasure from such writers. We don’t want the happiness that their work creates. And if without them, our lives become impoverished, so to speak, we will
make do with our poverty. We don’t want their riches.

I wish to ask all the readers and particularly friend Tsebion, who thinks that the that the artist and the creation must be separated, even when the creator is a Nazi; how would it be if Hitler, for instance, had an
exhibition of his pictures — he’s a painter, they say — and how would it be if you had an opportunity to go to the exhibition. Well, would you go? Will you enjoy it? Will you hang a painting of his in your house, over your bed? He paints, they say, pretty landscapes, gentle nature pictures.
And how would it be after the exhibition, if he is a great painter, almost a Raphael, a Leonardo Da Vinci, a Rembrandt? And how would it be if he wakes up one fine morning and starts to compose music, like Wagner, and even greater than Wagner’s? — What would you do then? ——

Well, by all means, hang his work over your bed!

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

Honestly, ‘tree‘ is probably the theme with the most poems devoted to it. Which was slightly unexpected when beginning all this. But in ending, that’s largely where we are. Not in this book, though.

What is an Age

What is an age? What does an age mean?
Must I only belong to the present age?
Doesn’t the mark of old Cain’s forehead
Burn on the face of a new reality?

Does Abel not lie on my doorstep now?
Is my table not Isaac’s Mount Moriah?
Do I not carry the order
From David to kill Uriah?

Is my bed not spattered red
With the blood of the concubine of Gibeah?
Does my gaze not wander, even now,
Over the slain in the desert at Meribah?

Does Moses not die in my attic, as on Mount Nebo,
Far from the tribes and their banners?
Do I not stand myself in the ranks
Of the spies, the profaners of his dream?

Am I not myself Titus, who burned God’s house?
Do I not also save the Western Wall today?
Do I not sit in a grave, covered in ash,
And not lament the lamentation of the Eicha-prophet?

Am I not the comb that tortured Akiba’s body?
Am I not myself torn into a thousand shreds?
Does the storm-wind not carry me up
To swing on Lekert and Botwin’s gallows?

Do I not hear how, in fire, on my threshold,
The blood of Zechariah and Yosef Chaim Brenner boils?
Am I not myself the smith who forges
Picks, chains and redemption flags?

Do I not bore through a whole four thousand years
With my stamped, hardened forehead?
What is an age? What does an age mean?
Must I belong to it alone?

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 24/03/2026

The only thing I ever wanted to save from the other place. It didn’t get my any lectures on where the word ‘robot’ comes from (I already knew) or about Deluze (I don’t give a shit) or someone telling me how it’s the only good stuff I ever did, the ‘deranged Yiddish housewife’ act.

A woman who looks like she’s got to the end of the Seder and is looking for a real good time. Or an advert for horseradish, take your pick.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 23/03/2026

Still your regular hedge-jargonist gremlin. But this is sweet. (It’s about Menachem)

We met at the beginning of the First World War, when he first arrived in New York. And he arrived, insofar as I recall, in a week when a writer’s ball occurred. And indeed it was at the ball that someone introduced me to him. I was still, so to speak, a new recruit to Yiddish literature. Reserved, not very bold, filled with anxiety and with great awe for a Yiddish poet. The last, I pray, will never leave me.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 21/03/2026

Very quick and dirty. Apparently it’s world poetry day I’m not overly enamoured of all the poems in this book, or even a majority of them, but this one got to me I think it has to be read in light of the Soviet poems, sitting at table after table with fellow writers, with his actually brothers.

Around a Table at Night

We, brothers, sat around at table at night
Eating a poor, ordinary meal.
No one was teacher to anyone,
No one saw a student in anyone,
No one spoke a word to anyone,
Until late in the night —
No word of redemption and end of days,
No hint at the Moshiach’s holy name.
We all ate in solitude,
Ate the poor feast.
Certainly no one around the table thought
That something might happen in the night
To put each to a deadly test
In the lonely hours of the night.
Something did happen, however —
The feast was the last:
An enemy suddenly beset us,
And all of us, to a man,
Dragged into a green forest
And without trial or sentence,
Under a sky of woven branches,
Slaughtered us all.
Just then, the true wonder happened:
We were again sat at the night table.
We ate in the same tent,
And one saw a teacher in the other,
And one was student to another —
Like good, close brothers
We sang end-of-night songs
To the sound of the Moshiach’s name
In the light of redemption, of the end of days.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 19/03/2026

A few terms untranslated, because that felt necessary. Anyway, I have a lot of crap eating the memory on this thing, so here’s Menachem Boreysh’s ‘Pure Blood’ from 1920. I’d give you a warning, but the whole thing’s a warning.

— Out of our whole family
We are the only two left:
I, Joel, and my sister Leah.
Two days we lay hidden
And didn’t sleep at all.
On the third day,
When the light from outside fled,
We, frozen with hunger and cold,
Embraced one another
And fell asleep.
Suddenly I heard in my sleep
As the door of our hiding place opened —
And he came in.
I didn’t see him, but sensed him,
That his face was the face of an ox,
That arrows sprung from his body,
That the grasp of his fingers was death —
And he started toward my sister.
I heard his step, heavy and dull.
And my hands clutched at my sister’s body —
Let us die together,
Before he tears us apart.
But he approached close. I felt
As the nakedness of her body was revealed
And heard her voice
In choked moans and cries.
I started to fight for her,
And wild were her stifled screams,
And strangled inside her
I myself, with animal sounds,
Bore his blows and the grasp of his fingers
Until he overcame us,
Overcame us both — her and me.

Then I heard my sister sob,
But my head was heavy
And my hands didn’t move.
When the greyness of day began to pour in,
I steeled myself and opened my eyes.
Her wet cheek stuck to my face,
And I heard as she said:
— Why did you do it?
— I wanted to protect you from him.
— From who?
— From him.
— But there was no one here.
— No one?
Confused, I took her hand,
The sweetness of her body went through me
And I remembered.

I said to her:
— Of all our father’s house
No one is left
Apart from me, Joel, and you, my sister Leah.
The world is ruined and unclean,

And the pure blood of our family
Would have disappeared.
God performed a miracle
And sent fear into our hiding place,
To teach me
How to uphold the pure blood
Of our father’s house.
Would you have preferred for a husband
One who would have come at night?
She embraced me with weak arms
And kissed me and cried.

On the fourth day we heard
As the sound of all days
Came to the street again
And we left our hiding place.
Then I went to the Rov and said:
— Rabbi, it’s a miracle!
My sister Leah has been rescued from tumah,
And she has become my wife.
And he looked at me with wild eyes
And his mouth froze open.
I said again:
— Why don’t you curse, Rabbi?
Cursed be he who lies with his sister, daughter of his father or daughter of his mother…
And when his words were still paralysed,
I whispered to him:
— Call me to a din-Torah, Rabbi!
Call me to a din-Torah with the Torah, Rabbi!
What is dearer to it, the Torah:
The dog’s blood in the bodies of our daughters,
Or the pure blood of a brother in his sister’s body?
And I left the house.

I walk in the street
And on my arm rests the hand
Of my pale wife.
When we meet with her friends,
With rags on their bodies to hide their motherhood,
They turn their heads away from us,
From brother and sister, the cursed.
But Leah, my wife,
Looks at them with pity and pain:
The one who sowed the murderous blood in them
Has ridden away on a wild horse
And won’t come hold their arm.
She presses closer to me
And her pious eyes grow damp.

When she births a son
I will name him for our father,
And our father’s house will be restored.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 15/03/2026

It’s Mother’s Day here, so here’s my shout out to Esther-Rifke Mirkin (her name varies according to source — sometimes given only as Esther Mirkin), Leivick’s mother, who was a baker by profession.

My Mother Went to the Rich Uncle

My mother went to the rich uncle
And came back with a full sack.
In the bag — my uncle’s old suit,
And my aunt’s dress with jacket and train.

The suit was cut for a dandy,
And the dress and jacket — for a fine lady.
My father was beset by an anguished trembling
As soon as he stretched a hand out to the clothes.

My father was an angry man, a Cohen,
A Jew, as you know, with a flaming beard.
His eyes flashed with brightness of snow,
With the Belarusian snows of the northwest.

And Mother was, like mothers, quiet —
Squandering her life in shop and market,
Her delicate face like a wronged prayer,
No one saw, no one noticed.

And I — a child — when I did see,
Felt my mother’s beauty from afar,
A word flowed into my mouth,
And I didn’t know what the word meant myself.

The house: four walls with winged windows,
A baker’s oven, dusty as a mill,
And sunbeams like golden doves
Danced on the earthen floor in the morning.

In this house, the size of four cubits,
I dared to rebel for the first time
When mother came — as I now tell —
And began to unpack the bag of presents.

My father put on the Odessa suit,
And Mother put on the dress with the train —
And I stifled a laugh of astonishment
When both lowered their heads in fear.

Then both turned their eyes
To me and, like me, also laughed —
Something like a darkness flew between us,
And something fell to the ground with a bang.

A moment, two — I opened my eyes again.
I suddenly saw such a brilliant light:
My father combed his beard out broad
And he looked at Mother with such joy in his face.

My mother was lithe, her hips singing,
Her cheeks burning modest and frum,
Her shoulders shaking like a bell ringing,
But her lips don’t say the word: Come.

Squeezed small, I looked at my mother,
And there surfaced in me, too sharply and too soon,
My first inkling of wounded beauty,
And I fell kissing my mother’s knees.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 13/03/2026

I don’t get a lot of love poems, so I take them where I get them and go back to them when I‘m stuck in 1938.

My Bright Song

My bright song flies away to you,
My hand outstretched to your distance;
Your trace in the snow — and snow filling my own —
Your trace, though, remaining in all directions.

I stood by your door and didn’t open it,
Speaking to the threshold, as if to an equal:
— Oh, help me, threshold, to throw my heart
With final courage, from too-soft door and step.

The doorstep shone so brotherly,
And stroked my forehead like a friend;
And I kissed that house so low,
In order to be lifted up through you.

In all the things of the world, the memory of you,
In walls and pavement, your breath is heard;
As if to your hand, I cling
To lampposts when loneliness comes.

Hanging-on — to passer-by, to everyone,
My body — my song — I joyfully give,
A happy man or a hopeless one —
Each carries in them a spark of you.

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 10/03/2026

I am seriously considering buying this CD (and facing whatever the import charges are) just to hear my old cantor’s voice again.

The cover of a CD called ‘Romemu — Exalt’ picturing a shul in Curacao

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Bluma @bluma.bsky.social · 10/03/2026

I’m rather intrigued by this poem toward the end of the ‘Merciful Sister’ sanatorium cycle/sequence…early in the series, the speaker tells the ‘sister’ — she’s a nursing sister — that he sees someone by the gate: a geyer…. (quick and dirty as always, no attempt at preserving the rhyme here)

— ‘Be my guest’ — He is silent a while.
(The word trembles on my tongue)
Suddenly — such childish questions:
(You will come to me, you will come)

How old am I, should I tell him?
(The word ignites on my tongue)
And how fast is my pulse?
(Will you not come to me? Will you not come?)

And where did my cradle stand?
(The word is like flame on my tongue)
Here or in some other land?
(Will you not come? Never come?)

I answer with mocking words:
(The word lies oppressed on my tongue)
‘My cradle stands in seven places
(I will come to you, I will come)

‘A man isn’t born once,
(The word dances on my tongue)
‘The pulse first comes to life in the coffin —‘
(You will come to me. You will come.)

My words please the comer.
(The word doesn’t want to be on my tongue)
He says over all the thresholds:
(I will come to you, I will come)

‘It’s here — the hour of hours,
(The word is like blood on my tongue)
‘Adieu.’ — He disappears and — is no more.)
(Will you not come? Never come?)

I send my song-poem to the gates.
(The word rejoices on my tongue)
The geyer walks with face to the woods.
(I will come to you, I will come)

He strides, he skips over hills,
(The word is sweet on my tongue)
On mirrored white wings.
(You will come to me, you will come)

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