POEM: ‘Voices’
I am walking. I am always walking. Where
am I walking? I am not here.
From where is this kindling in my arms?
This fire? They are not mine. I am not mine. In vain
– I am in your footsteps, in vain…
I know, my son, I am the father.
I lead you, the two of us walk together.
– I am not asleep. I am not awake.
I am asleep. My heart is awake
a ram bound by its black ribs.
A still stutter falls silent among the boughs
of time entangled in its day and night…
– Yes, I am here.
No!
From “In the Illuminated Dark: Selected Poems of Tuvia Ruebner” translated by Rachel Tzvia Back (Hebrew Union College Press, in collaboration with University of Pittsburgh Press, 2014).
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
