Avrom Sutzkever (1913-)
Frozen Jews

Irving Howe, Ruth R. Wisse and Khome Shmeruk (eds.): «The Penguin Book of Modern Yiddish Verse», Penguin Books, 1988. Copyright © Irving Howe, Ruth Wisse, and Chone Shmeruk, 1987. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Have you seen, in fields of snow,
frozen Jews, row on row?

Blue marble forms lying,
Not breathing, not dying.

Somewhere a flicker of a frozen soul--
glint of fish in an icy swell.

All brood. Speech and silence are one.
Night snow encases the sun.

A smile glows immobile
from a rose lip's chill.

Baby and mother, side by side.
Odd that her nipple's dried.

Fist, fixed in ice, of a naked old man:
the power's undone in his hand.

I've sampled death in all guises.
Nothing surprises.

Yet a frost in July in this heat--
a crazy assault in the street.

I and blue carrion, face to face.
Frozen Jews in a snowy space.

Marble shrouds my skin.
Words ebb. Light grows thin.

I'm frozen, I'm rooted in place
like the naked old man enfeebled by ice.

Moscow,
July 10, 1944

(from the Yiddish by Cynthia Ozick)

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