Nov 01, 2020
INTRODUCTION
The following two poems by Yoysef Kerler are striking for a number of reasons. When people, particularly perhaps in the west, think of Jewish accounts of World War II, they tend to envision ghettos and concentration camps, to conjure up hiding and fleeing. When we think of armed Jews during WWII, we envision clandestine armed resistance Jews took up on their own, or in special partisan units.
Kerler, who was originally from Ukraine, wrote these poems while serving with the Red Army. War poems constituted his first book, Far Mayn Erd/For My Land, released when publishing poetry in Yiddish was still permitted in the Soviet Union.
The land — or as I have translated it in the second poem included here, the earth — referred to seems clearly to be that of the Soviet Union. Noticeably, Kerler does not claim he is fighting for the lives of Jews, though he would explore his grief over the Holocaust throughout the rest of his career.
A decade after these poems were published, Kerler, an early refusenik who would serve five years in the gulag, had stopped referring to the Soviet Union as his erd, as his land. He began to call it, instead, his cradleland, and to consider Israel his homeland.
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זעץ איך זיך צו בײַ דעם בױגן פּאַפּיר —
שפּרײטן זיך פֿעלדער פֿאַרשנײטער פֿאַר מיר
און בײַ דעם ערשטן פֿאַרשריבענעם אות —
פֿײַפֿט שױן דער װינט און סע שטאַרקט זיך דער פּראָסט...
גלײַך װי די סטראָפֿע געשלאָסן נאָר װערט,
פּױזען מיר צוגעדריקט האַרט צו דער ערד.
דעם שׂונאם טראַנשײען — אָט זײַנען זײ באַלד
און עמעצער רופֿט שױן און עמעצער פֿאַלט,
און עמעץ פֿאַרשװײַגט שױן דאָס לעצטע געשרײ — —
— — —
שורות, װי שנירעלעך בלוט אױפֿן שנײ.
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I sit myself down at the blank sheet —
Snow-covered fields spread out before me
And with the first letter scribed —
The wind whistles and the frost starts to bite…
Just as the stanzas come to a close,
We crawl, pressed stiff to the ground.
To the enemy’s trenches – here they are now
And someone is calling and somebody falls,
And someone stifles their very last shout – –
– – –
Lines, like trickles of blood in the snow.
געזעגעניש
אױב אײנזאַם װעט קומען מײַן פֿערד אױף צוריק
און טרױעריק נײגן זײַן קאָפּ צו דײַן פּלױט,
דײַן װײגעשרײ, שװעסטער־מײַן־כּלה, דערשטיק —
ניט גלײב, אַז דער שׂונא האָט מיך שױן געטײט.
און װעט מען דיר ברענגען ס׳פֿאַרבלוטיקטע העמד,
דו װעסט עס דערקענען —פֿאַרברעך ניט די הענט —
איך לעב נאָך, איך שטײ אױף די פֿיס און איך שלאָג,
װײַל דו ביסט מיט מיר און מיט מיר איז דער טאָג.
נאָר װעט מען דיר װײַזן מײַן ביקס און מײַן שװערד —
װײַס, אַז געפֿאַלן בין איך פֿאַר מײַן ערד.
יולו 1941
Parting
If my horse should come back alone
and with sorrow lower its head at your fence,
your painful cry, my sister, my bride, you must repress —
do not believe that the enemy has killed me.
And should they bring you my blood-stained shirt,
you will recognize it — wring not your hands —
I am still alive, I stand firm on my feet and I fight,
because you are with me and with me is daylight.
But if they should show you my gun and my sword —
know, that I have fallen for my earth.