Post by moira on Oct 23, 2008 23:45:55 GMT 2
Shin Shifra
was born in Tel Aviv in 1931, to a family rooted in Jerusalem since the mid-19th century. She studied Kabbalah, Hebrew Literature, and Education at Hebrew University, Jerusalem and at Tel Aviv University. At Bar Ilan University, she studied the Sumerian and Akkadian languages. She taught creative writing to high school students and currently lectures on Ancient Near Eastern Literature at Tel Aviv University. Her publications include poetry, prose, interviews with prominent Israeli writers, literary criticism and translations of Sumerian and Akkadian literature. She has twice been awarded The Prime Minister’s Prize.
ONE MAN (from Mistress Poems)
(From Hebrew: Riva Rubin)
One man thought that a woman could,
should, had to love him with
only the strong, brief, timeless
clasp of her thighs, never
imagining that a woman didn’t
need to, didn’t have to, but could
love a man heart and soul, without
the strong, brief, timeless
clasp of her thighs.
And one man thought that a woman could,
should, had to love him heart and soul,
strong, long and timeless, never
imagining that a woman didn’t need to,
didn’t have to, but could love a man
with only the strong, brief, timeless
clasp of her thighs.
SO MANY YEARS
A man loved me so
much and I could not,
I could not give back
what he wanted for so many
many years without number.
I loved a man so much
so much and he could not,
he could not give back
what I wanted for so many
many years without number.
The man that loved
me, the man that I loved, both
have gone on the road-with-no-return,
what’s a woman to do
MISTRESS POEMS
What comfort can a mistress find
in the empty nights if not letters
from a man who for years and years
has loved her, because the man
she has loved for about as long
abandons her to her sighs
not only in her dreams, but in lousy
hotel rooms, deserted
orchards, in the middle of the road,
at café tables receiving notes
from faceless postman-waiters,
what comfort can a woman find
in the empty nights.