1. White Russia

Ah, my grandpa in Kobylnik is a simple sort of fellow;
A farmer with a horse and with an ax and with a sheepskin.
As common as the clay are all
My sixteen uncles and my father,
Hauling logs out of the forest; driving rafts upon the river.
They toil the livelong day like ordinary peasants,
Then eat their supper of an evening gathered round a single platter;
And fall into their sixteen beds like sheaves of grain — together.
Grandpa — ah, my grandpa… he can hardly climb the oven…
Half asleep at supper, his poor old eyes kept closing;
And yet, his feet have somehow found their own way to the oven;
My grandpa’s loyal feet which served him for so many years.

Translated by Leonard Wolf

Listen to the famed declaimer of Yiddish poetry, Hertz Grosbard, recite this.

2. Hay Mowing

Over the fields the autumn mist had begun to stray.
Grandpa left at dawn for the marsh to mow the hay.
At the raking, when day came,
like jolly musicians dazed
eighteen they stood, grandfather first,
and sang a psalm of praise.
A step, a twist of the shoulders, a whistle,
as if swamp-lightning leapt.
For a piece of bread, children (my grandfather spoke),
one has to sweat.
And the scythes whistled more brightly…
Coats off, with hairy limbs like the hairy firs —
an old father with seventeen blood-brothers…
The scythes twitch, dew spurts out,
and the grasses fall, one on the other.
A bird sings in a nut tree nearby;
grandfather cannot be serene:
“What do you say to that? A canary, a cantor,
right on the scene!”

Now they sharpen their scythes, smoke,
grab a sip from the pitcher;
Then arise with a groan… “Pomohey bokh!”
A clang, and the scythe is all glitter.
Appears, disappears in the grass, blazes out —
eighteen scythes in order!
And the hands bend with sureness, the legs crack,
and sturdily rises each border —
Until all of them see the red twilight dim
on their scythes and decrease,
And all of them smile. They can see the broad herring
and grandma’s pancakes of cheese.
They throw on their coats, they walk along listening
to the quails shout.
With their scythes on their shoulders
they gaze and are mute as the trout.

Translated by Sarah Betsky-Zweig

3. My Grandma

My grandma was a modest woman,
A champion of childbearing — a child every spring.
And easily, and quite painlessly, like hens laying eggs,
She laid sets of twins — twins after twins she would bring.
Three uncles, Grandma bore in the garret,
Two uncles, Grandma mislaid in the coop,
Eleven uncles, Grandma bore by the oven,
My father, Grandma bore in a barn…
And then her womb was closed for good.
Grandma, most cherished, had done what she needed to
And she walked about the house,
Like a duck amidst her hatchlings.

Translated by Robert Adler Peckerar

Listen to Hertz Grosbard, recite this in the original Yiddish.

4. Driving the Rafts

The mists have erased and smudged every road, every town.
In the field your warm face meets the cold
of rain coming down.
Blotches of tree, of some yard,
the pulley on a well, touch your gaze,
but something swims up, your eye faces white —
in the mist all is haze.
A withered branch falls. It is quiet.
A bird sings in despair:
“In this life there is so much to endure,
so much to bear”…
Tens of rivulets splashing in their beds
chattered and murmured;
through the far-far mists on the Nieman
grandfather’s voice is heard:

Listen to Hertz Grosbard recite this in the original Yiddish.

“Shmulye, hey Shmulye.
Get your rear end to Skarulye.”
Grandpa, wet-bearded, crawls about
and fingers the barges.
In the mist, the uncles with long hooks step over the rafts.
Now they vanish. Off on one side
their shouted talk emerges.
The sinkers splash, a hole, the river is slashed.
The mist fills up the clay banks,
there is no water, there is no land,
and the region is so soft, its texture —
a breath warm and bland…
but something is unfolding…the manifold valleys
and forests loom.
There houses stand shrouded in bareness, furniture
in a rich man’s room.

Listen to Hertz Grosbard recite this in the original Yiddish.

Here green lucidity bursts open…
even one’s soul grows clear.
The sun shines forth,
water and lame weeping willows appear.
The forest has taken a bath, is wet,
and his head is a flare,
and brightness walks far off in a meadow…
a peasant plows there.
A lushness, a freshness of grass meadows
that smell, shimmer, complain,
and scraps of mist still swim about —
the dreams of field and plain…
Slowly, slowly the rafts float,
swing round with the shores of the stream.
The straw huts radiate their moisture
and rain into steam.
There rests Grandpa, smoking his pipe
and squinting his eyes in delight.
The warm earth has lustily stretched itself out, all plump and bright,
checkered by fields, by marshes yellow and lucent and green.

Listen to Hertz Grosbard recite a part of this in the original.

The transparent trembling flax tumbles
over on its stalks, amber and thin.
The green on field-potatoes lies opaque, limp, exhausted…
and the short pink buckwheat smiles
with white speckles frosted.
The earth-saps are rising, in the body drunkenness reigns.
A voiceless life thrusts through grass,
through root and through tendril.
Grandpa can no longer bear it,
O, he cannot keep still.
He bellows: “May your father have the tremors!”
And once more again:
“May your mother have the tremors!” The sons
on their barges jump up,
they see from the fields are flowing in streams
hot colors of flame.
The world is sprouting with Spring, and they too are right
at its hub.
Lord of the Universe — on these fields something is happening
that has no name!

Listen to Hertz Grosbard recite this in the original Yiddish.

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

So Grandpa, may he rest in peace, the rafts into Prussia floated,
and at twilight from the blue Viliya into the white Nieman boated.
The anchors were buried in sand, the heavy barges tied,
and on each of the barges my uncles lit fires.
Mute with fatigue, two to a fire, so they sat greyed.
Broke the rose-colored bread and ate the borsht from a pot.

It was quiet in the region. Only the blue waves sang;
only the echoing fire leafed out, a red flower, and spread,
and once in a while in the water a fish sprang.
It was blue, and a red moon, ponderous, rose overhead.

Translated by Sarah Betsky-Zweig

5. The Viliya and the Nieman

When the moon spatters the earth, like a silvery rain,
A solid figure of a Lithuanian rises from the Nieman
And, unheard, from the Viliya a dark lady swims out to him,
Her hair tousled, wet, her lashes long and mossy
Unveiling her smooth body from the waves…
Then the Nieman bends and embraces her,
And kisses her eyes so green which gleam from sadness,
And takes her ashore to his blue crystal chambers…

Translated by Robert Adler Peckerar

6. Uncle Avrom Pastures the Horses

At night, Uncle Avrom looked after the horses.
He had food in his sack; and was wrapped in a sheepskin
From which only his legs showed, stretched toward the fire
Beside which he sat like a stump, and as silent.

That was the way that he pastured the horses ….
They, impeded by hobbles, clumped through the meadow
Where the shimmering moonlight touched the mares gently
And the fog-shrouded Nieman distantly sounded.

When his dry little fire winked out, exhausted,
Avrom sat like a sleeper, engrossed in the silence
As tree into tree merged in the shadows,
And what could be heard was the grass being cropped and devoured.

And what could be heard were the stars in the sky now in motion,
As if smoke in a wisp had enclosed them in music;
And the sky that was empty now gleamed in a network
Of light in which fish were gleaming and bobbling.

Avrom tilted his face toward the heavens
Where the cold yellow disk of the moon was seen wheeling.
There, suddenly, seventeen stars flew together,
One of them green — the one that shone brightest.

As from a blue eye a spark might go darting,
So the star, all at once, as if seized by a spasm,
Plunged from the sky toward the network of light;
Then fell to the earth; to a moss-covered thicket.

Avrom felt something distant and dreamlike
And glittering blue that touched the whole region;
Sighing, he stood and turned his attention
To the warm mares where they stood in the shadows.

There, for a while, he worked with the horses
Where, neck over neck, they stood heavily breathing.
Sometimes the light slanted and touched a horse briefly,
And revealed for a moment its work-weary shoulder.

The cluster of mares formed a pool in the shadows.
Tired, my uncle crept back to his straw hut
While the leaves of the poplar shone dim in the darkness
And wheat in the distance trembled in moonlight.

On the floor of the hut, my uncle lay dreaming
Of his village; he smiled to himself and was silent;
Then slowly, his heart overflowed with a longing,
And Avrom, my uncle, was suddenly singing:

You are the loveliest one in the village, Nastasya,
See,
The barley is pleased; the oat is bearded;
The swamp is gleaming with moisture.
Listen,
Listen,
In the forest, the fir tree moves like a dreamer
In moonlight;
Covered with moss, a barefooted spirit.
Come to the fields while the birds are still sleeping;
While only the brooks are awake; and your father
Lies in the barn, worn out by his day’s work.
No one will know but the ash tree that grows in the courtyard,
And the night breeze that naps in the reeds.
You are the loveliest one in the village, Nastasya.

Wiping the tears from his eyes with his coat sleeve
Avrom heard how the dream-enclosed district lay silent
While a heart bade farewell to a heart in the darkness.

Translated by Leonard Wolf

7. Grandma, May She Rest in Peace, Died

When Grandma, so very old, was near death
little birds were singing.
With her charity, her generous heart
the world was ringing.

And when Grandma was carried down
no one made a sound,
and no one groaned when the good old one
was laid out upon the ground.

Grandpa roamed about the house,
a broken earthen pot,
because he, the old one, had promised her
to die first would be his lot.

And when the corpse was brought to town,
the whole village cried:
“Nie ma, nie ma już staroj Szliomiche.”
And the priest Vassily sympathized…

But when the sexton drew his knife
to rip their mourning clothes,
only then my uncles, poor wretches, screamed
like killers at the gallows.

Translated by Sarah Betsky-Zweig

8. Nastasya

Nastasya was gathering sorrel on the footpaths
To make a meal for her father, Antosha.
Byelorussia is blessed with cold, shaggy sorrel,
With fir trees like pelts, and ravens like cinders.
Bowed, she went through the fields, clutching her apron.
She moved like a duckling that knows neither evil nor sorrow.
Her feet, moistened by dew and tinged by the light of the morning.

Her hand at her eyes, she watched as he came from a distance
Out of the woods, in his arms a horse-collar.
Her hand at her eyes, she watched as he came from a distance.
His step was so lively—as if he had slept in the forest.

Shyly, Nastasya bent once again to the sorrel,
It was Avrom, at dawn, coming back from tending the horses.
“Good morning, Nastasya. Timid, sweet lambkin, good morning!”
Nastasya, embarrassed, tried hiding herself in the bushes
Hoping that Avrom, my sturdy young uncle, might miss her,
But Avrom plunged into the thicket at once and his laughter,
Deep in the leaves, could be heard a far distance.
“Lambkin, my sweet one, my darling. Where are you?”
Hidden in leaves, Nastasya was pleased by my uncle.
“He looks so lively, as if he had slept in the forest.”
He was tan and excited. His eyes glowed and his hair was disheveled,
He found her at last in the grass—half afraid, half delighted.
She was scared, as a pullet might be when sunlight pierces a shower.
Then Nastasya was caught in his arms; he embraced her,
And kissed her tanned throat, though she trembled,
Till, startled by pleasure, she wriggled against him
And pressed herself silently to him, closer and closer.

Translated by Leonard Wolf

9. Uncle Itzy

My Uncle Itzy had mastered
Needlecraft through and through,
And he made old ragged cloaks
As good as new,
And he made old ragged cloaks
As good as new.

He’d arrive in a village
With his needle and thread
And he hung out his shingle:
“Garments Repaired Here,” it read,
And he hung out his shingle:
“Garments Repaired Here,” it read.

Uncle Itzy sat at the table
With a vacant look, legs crisscrossed,
Ripping, reversing, affixing
patch upon cloth,
Ripping, reversing, affixing
patch upon cloth.

Having fully patched one village,
Onto the next he flitted,
Until he let out from his hands
A region fully befitted.
Until he let out from his hands
A region fully befitted.

My Uncle Itzy mastered
Needlecraft through and through,
And he made old ragged cloaks
As good as new,
And he made old ragged cloaks
As good as new.

Translated by Robert Adler Peckerar

10. Winter at Night in the Old Hut

My stupefied uncles lay in the old hut
And stared with exhaustion at night where they lay.
Smoking big pipes, they murmured and panted­ —
One sat at a table snoring and sweating —
A last bit of torch on the wall was still burning;
By its light, Uncle Rakhmiel stitched up his trousers.
Wind pounded the hut and snow lashed the window.
The oven door scraped at the wall, and my grandpa
Twisted and turned on the oven; he was weak
And enveloped in fear; his nightshirt unbuttoned.
The wind on the meadow stirred up the waves of the Nieman.
The old cow in the barn kept up her incessant complaining.
The uncles, by twos, lay in their beds. They turned their dull faces
And gazed at the rafters in silence.
My grandfather, twisting and turning, begged his son, “Avrom,
My child, won’t you give us a sad song?”
Then Avrom crawled from his warm bed —
There, in the dark, he was gray as a fir tree —
And sang, like the wind stirring the leaves in the autumn.

Listen to Hertz Grosbard recite this in the original Yiddish.

Then howled in the dark as a wolf does
At night on the roads; as a wolf might
Howl on a snow-dazzled plain.
Like logs, my uncles lay huddled
As my grandfather beat at the oven
And wept, “O Lord, help us,
Life is dark; life is bitter.”
Through Avrom’s strong frame passed a shudder,
And his song gave a spurt, like a mirror;
Like a lake in blue fog it resounded —
And he was as dark as an oak and as sturdy.
He threw his hair back and put himself in position,
Like a stallion that yearns for a hot mare,
(For, in a dream, he had seen the young Gentile, Nastasya).
Then he danced with his hands on his hips and he kindled
A gleam of delight in the eyes of the watchers,
Till the griefs in the hut fled like gray magpies.
Avrom danced and he sang and he stamped with his great boots;
His eyes glowed; the air scorched; he was flame; he was fire;
Till my grandfather felt that he and the hut were both flying,
That he was creeping up high on a broken-runged ladder.

Listen to Hertz Grosbard recite this in the original Yiddish.

My uncle stood still, confused by his singing.
The last bit of torch flickered out in its socket.
Grandpa smiled, rubbed his hands, and said, “Avrom,
Where’d you get such a voice?” The blue dawn-light
Crept into the hut. The trees in the garden,
Wound round with straw, were still freezing.
The wind in the cart shed plucked wool from a sheepskin;
The old cow in the barn lapsed at last into silence.

Translated by Leonard Wolf

Listen to Hertz Grosbard recite (nearly all of) this in the original Yiddish.

11. Antosha Plays His Bandura

Hey, hey, hey,
Hey, Antosha: Raise your voice,
Make some noise
On the bandura:
Shura, bura, mura, tura,
Just that way,
Hey, hey.

Once there lived the Duke of Kryvia,
As white as snow,
As white as snow,
He had children in his palace,
Daughters two,
Daughters two.
But at the Duke’s, in his stables
Served young Dmitruk Skarulye,
Who is known as the Rapscallion.

Listen to Hertz Grosbard recite this (with a small variation) in the original Yiddish.

Hey, hey, hey,
Hey, Antosha: Raise your voice,
Make some noise
On the bandura:
Shura, bura, mura, tura,
Just that way,
Hey, hey!

And the springtime came a-springing.
On the trees new branches bringing,
The swallow nestled with her fledgling,
The goat took home her kiddie offspring,
And the cow her little calf….
And the springtime came a-springing,
For the daughters, for those two,
To the Duke they came home bringing
In their aprons
Their misbegotten.
Alas, alas, alack a-day!

Listen to Hertz Grosbard recite this in the original Yiddish.

So, the Duke took to his sword,
And the Duke bade horses harnessed,
And from Kreva to Mazyr,
From Dzyatlava to Damir,
The knights and chariots gave chase,
And the footmen and couriers ran.
And nowhere was there
To be seen
That dread bandit the Rapscallion.

Hey, hey, hey,
Hey, Antosha: Raise your voice,
Make some noise
On your bandura:
Shura, bura, mura, tura,
Just that way,
Hey, hey!

Listen to Hertz Grosbard recite this in the original Yiddish.

In the forests of Kryvichi
Dwells the brigand the Rapscallion.
And the aged Duke of Kryvia,
As white as snow,
As white as snow,
Rides alone upon the plains,
In his knightly coat of armor,
And his weapon goes on rattling
Through the night,
Through the night…

Hey, hey, hey,
Hey, Antosha: Raise your voice,
Make some noise
On your bandura:
Shura, bura, mura, tura,
Just that way,
Hey, hey!

Translated by Robert Adler Peckerar

Listen to Hertz Grosbard recite this in the original Yiddish.

12. Grandfather Dying

Gray as a dove, toward evening, my grandfather came from the pasture;
He made up his bed and said a prayer of confession,
Then inwardly bade his farewell to the world
And closed his eyes, utterly exhausted.
My uncles came in and gathered around at his bedside;
Bowing their shaggy heads they stood about, silent;
Something clutched at their hearts that left them all wordless­ —
Clutched at their hearts and kept them from sighing.
Then slowly my grandfather opened his eyes, and a smile
Spread over his face; he sat up,
though it cost him much trouble;
And here’s what he said to his sons:

“You, my Ortsheh,
You’ve been the family keystone;
First in the field and the last one to sit at the table. The earth
opened warmly to you and your plowshare.
May your seed, like the earth, be forever as fresh and as fertile.
And you, Rakhmiel, who is like you in the meadow?
Your scythe in the field was an outburst of fire.
You are known to the birds in the air; to the snakes in their marshes.
May my blessing rest on your barn; and blessed be your stable.
You, Shmulye, river man; who in the world is like you?
Eternally wet; and always a lash at your shoulders;
Smelling of fish scales, and smells of the scum of the river,
Blessed shall you be on the shore,
And blessed on the water.”

It was evening; the glimmer of red at the window
Cast in the darkness, a tinge of light on my grandpa;
My uncles were still; and silent, too, was my father.
And caught every word of his blessing.
Then Grandfather said his goodbyes and gathered his limbs together;
He closed his wide eyes one more time, now and forever.
The watchers looked on and regarded his muted body;
There was nothing to see; and no tear was shed by my uncles.
A bird in the forest sang to the night of its sorrows;
The last bit of torch in the hut still gleamed in its socket.
My uncles formed a small band round my grandfather’s pillow,
Their heavy, their shaggy heads drooped on their shoulders.

Translated by Leonard Wolf