36
Itaca
Pagina de poezie în limba engleză
Kaddish for Misha The Lady Sings the Blues, Backwards
Valery Oişteanu (S.U.A.)
Without you, Leo!
I am reading the transliterated Hebrew prayer
Kaddish for Misha to my father on the 10th anniversary
Over a crude grave for Maileh ben Kolem.
The journey to eternity begins at noon, April 7, 2003
At the Sephardic Cemetery in Bucharest.
Ishkadal ve-isskadal shme raba Accept as an honored guest Mihail Oighenstein
Born May 4, 1916 in Beltzi Just one month shy of his 87th birthday, A crude pine coffin covered with black velvet.
Passed away in his sleep at the Jewish Community Nursing Home His son Andrei reads a farewell let- ter between the tears
In front of the family and high powered mourners, His niece Anca places flowers on the casket
And we all make peace with his memory
Asking for forgiveness and forgiving back in kind.
Suddenly four burly-looking gravediggers burst into the chapel Transporting him with an ancient wheel cart to the freshly dug grave They are dressed in peasants fur hats and rubber boots And lower his coffin with a thud,
The dogs are quiet now, some lurking next to the grave. I am trying to scare them away. “Don’t provoke them” says Angela “They will gang up on you!” Don’t worry; I have the powers of “the Purgatory dog master”. I say with deep voice “Stay away!” to the strays They listen to my gurgling sound and scurry to the bush
As I recite the lines of the Kaddish, The old cantor repeats them after me. I ask myself if my father’s soul will ascend to Heaven
The wet earth falls on his casket from my mother’s hand She cannot lift the heavy shovel. Amana, my niece holds the flowers Close to her, before spreading them Over the fresh dirt on top of his grave Where is he going… to the Paradise for commies?
His eternal destination at the end of the bumpy ride called life He survived pogroms and Stalin, wars and revolution
Escaped from German POW camps and Russian gulag Helping others at the great danger to himself
He was a good husband and a good father to my brother.
He showed righteous behavior to his family and friends, A real mensch, idealists till the end Our tears fall on the broken gray gravestones I forgive him for everything…. So may his soul rest in peace!
The Lady Sings the Blues, Backwards
Seulb! She sings, Seulb! on manic panic street
Left eye missing, eye-patch on the right eye
Her left foot in the right high heel shoe The right hand in the left red glove The left hand holds love in a suitcase Her absent mind unfitting in the dark room
The errant heart lost aboard an un- moving train
Inside the cathedral there is a big tree Dead birds hanging from the dead forest
The church bells chimes six, and again The clock shows always six twenty A pregnant angel is due to give birth His left wing is missing, scars on the back
Screeching sounds from the right wing Refuses to accept hospital delivery
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