The Ballad Of The Long Hair And The Short Hair by Yehudah Amichai Translated by Orna Raz

Today we no longer write poems about wars, heroism or the women who wait at home. But as we are in a midst of a depressing war here in Israel, I find this poem, by the Israeli poet Yehudah Amichai, about another war-- the Israeli Independence war (1948), powerful and sad. I hope that it works  in English

The ballad of the long hair and the short hair by Yehudah Amichai

Translated by Orna Raz

His hair was shaven  when he got into the camp

Her hair remained long with no answer

“I can’t hear you in this growing noise”

You long hair, my girl, my short hair

Throughout the summer flowers practiced blooming,

Inside the patient earth as they built their strength .  

 “I returned to you, but was not the same.”

Your long hair, my love, my short hair

  

The wind broke the tree, the tree broke the wind  

They had many options and very little time to rest

 “It’s raining, come home quick”

Your long hair, my girl, your short hair

The world became for them, an indirect speech.

Doesn’t touch them, slowly they began to sing

 “I set my watch when are you coming back?”

Your long hair, my girl, your short hair

..

Then they fell silent, like distant steps

The sky opened, the book of laws closed

“What  are you saying, and what are you?”

Your long hair, my girl, your short hair

.

A Short Middle-Aged Lover: The "American" Poet Yehudah Amichai

JUL.08.2013 -

As we were walking toward the hall where he was giving a  reading, the poet Yehudah Amichai  (1924—2000) suddenly turned to me and said: “I always feel so awkward  before readings, the students expect the writer of all those love poems, to be a great lover and here I am a short middle-aged man.”

At that time I was the program director at the Hillel House of the University of Iowa, and Yehudah Amichai was our guest lecturer.

As soon as we entered the room it was clear that Amichai was wrong; the audience, most of whom were students at the Writers' Workshop, had long known his poetry and admired him. Moreover, since Amichai's  poems worked so well in English, they regarded him as one of their own –a great American poet.

Amichai is considered by many, both in Israel and internationally, as Israel's greatest modern poet. He was well aware of his stature, but still was not afraid to reveal a more vulnerable side. I suspect that the apprehension that Amichai  felt before his reading contributed to his very personal and warm performance during the reading.

I remember that when one of the students asked him about his work habits, he answered that he did not write every day, and that most of his poems came to him when he was taking walks. The students seemed quite surprised at that answer, as they must have expected him to say that he wrote every day at his study.

At a reading in Princeton, the writer Jonathan Safran Foer told the audience that in his senior year at Princeton in 1999 he heard Yehuda Amichai give one of his final readings in the Stewart theater. While listening to Amichai, Foer realized that he wanted "to somehow move somebody" just as Amichai had moved him. "I wouldn't be up here if it weren't for Amichai."

I too have an Amichai  moment which I cherish; once, several years prior to that reading in the Hillel House, he had been to Iowa City for a reading. At its end I was asked to drive him to his hotel. Once there I realized that it was still early and invited Amichai to our home, he accepted gladly. My husband Tzvi was there with our young daughters, and when we got home Amichai asked first to see my two sleeping girls. I was really touched. 

This anecdote reminds me of another, somewhat similar  story. When Yitzhak Rabin visited the White House, president Jimmy Carter asked him if he wanted to see the sleeping Amy.  Rabin, perhaps out of shyness, declined and missed an opportunity to bond with the parents of the sleeping girl.  Many political analysts, and Carter himself in his memoir, regard this famous incident as a serious faux pas

In contrast,  Amichai’s  human approach and  exceptional personal  skills, combined with his strong and timeless poetry which so easily translated into English, contributed to his great success outside Israel. Evidence of his popularity can be seen in the fact that Amichai sold his archive for over $200,000 to the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library of Yale University.

The English poet Ted Hughes, who translated Amichai's poems into English together with Amichai himself, wrote in the Times Literary Supplement: "I've become more than ever convinced that Amichai is one of the biggest, most essential, most durable poetic voices of this past century – one of the most intimate, alive and human, wise, humorous, true, loving, inwardly free and resourceful, at home in every human situation.”

I agree, and to illustrate his power in English here  is one of his love  poems translated  from Hebrew by Amichai and Ted Hughes

 Once a Great Love

Once a great love cut my life in two.

The first part goes on twisting

at some other place like a snake cut in two.

The passing years have calmed me

and brought healing to my heart and rest to my eyes.

And I’m like someone standing in

the Judean desert, looking at a sign:

“Sea Level.”

He cannot see the sea, but he knows.

Thus I remember your face everywhere

at your “face level.”

No Prophet Is Accepted In Her Own Town": The Writer Nina Barragan

The University of Iowa, in Iowa City, is the home of the distinguished Writers' Workshop and the International Writers' Workshop, and it has always been a paradise for literature lovers.

I was a graduate student in Comparative Literature, and had a job as a program director at the local Hillel House. My goal was to make our Hillel  a literary center. Thus I created a weekly series: "The Wednesday Night Café" where every week another writer (they were mostly Jewish or Israeli) gave a reading and talked about his/her  work.

No doubt the most moving reader was Yehudah Amichai, the great Israeli poet, but there were many other inspiring nights. For me a memorable reading was given by a local Jewish American/Argentinian writer: Rocío Lasansky Weinstein.

As she read two of her short stories, we realized that Rocio was a very good writer. However, that was not unusual, most of the readers were excellent: after all they were either part of the Writers' Workshop or residents of the International Writers' Workshop.

But the fact that in spite of her great talent, Rocio was not accepted to the MFA program in creative writing, was most unusual. She applied to the Writers' Workshop several times, but each time her application was rejected.

Most of the students at the workshop were young, in their early to mid twenties. They were aspiring writers who came to Iowa City from all over the US to get an MFA in Creative Writing. Rocio was different, she grew up in Iowa City, a daughter of a well known artist who taught at the university -- Marurico  Lasansky. She was older, a married woman, and a mother of four children.

 Rocio has been writing for years, and was serious and honest in her work. At the reading she told the audience that she started writing when she was nine year old, after her father had given her a handsome notebook on a family trip to Europe.

 I find it hard to believe that the decision makers at the Writers' Workshop could not recognize her exceptional gift. But probably they preferred to admit to the prestigious program students who "were in their own image."

At readings  by members of the Writers' Workshop at Hillel I was often  surprised how similar their stories were. The students’ texts were beautiful--polished and well crafted, but often lacked in real substance. Rocio in contrast, had a lot to say, after all in her forty some years she had accumulated some experience and insights.

Rocio was quite surprised when I called to schedule her reading at Hillel, no one had asked her to read before. And this was Iowa City where even the tiniest bookstore had regular readings. And speaking of the art of reading, at the time, in the late 80s, the readers from the Writers Workshop, all had the same style of reading --the same melody. Even in that aspect Rocio was different, she just read her stories in a straight forward way with no drama.

It happens all too often that “no prophet is accepted in his hometown:” Mark 6:4.  But at least in Rocio's case she got recognition outside her own town. I was delighted to get, several years after I left Iowa City, a  package in the mail, it was a book of short stories: No Peace at Versailles and Other Stories  by  Nina 

Barragan (1996) which is the pen name of Rocio Lasansky Weinstein.

PS. A sample of Nina Barragan's writing:

http://arttimesjournal.com/art/Art_Essays/feb-14-nina-barragan/mauricio-...