The work of A. Sutzkever, one of the major twentieth-century masters of verse and the last of the great Yiddish poets, is presented to the English reader in this banquet of poetry, narrative verse, and poetic fiction. Sutzkever's imposing body of work links images from Israel's present and past with the extinction of the Jews of Europe and with deeply personal reflection on human existence. In Sutzkever's poetry the Yiddish language attains a refinement, richness of sound, and complexity of meaning unknown before. His poetry has been translated into many languages, but this is the most comprehensive presentation of his work in English. Benjamin Harshav provides a biography of the poet and a critical assessment of his writings in the context of his times. The illustrations were originally created for Sutzkever's work by such artists as Marc Chagall, Yosl Bergner, Mane-Katz, Yankl Adler, and Reuven Rubin. A. Sutzkever was born in 1913 and spent his early years in Siberia. He grew up in Vilna, Lithuania, the Jewish cultural capital of Eastern Europe, and when the Nazi occupation caught him in the Vilna Ghetto he worked vigorously to save valuable manuscipts and cultural treasures. Joining the partisans in the forest, he was smuggled out to Moscow, where he told the world about the extinction and resistance of the Jews. He arrived in Israel in 1947, before the state was created, and founded Di Goldene Keyt , the preeminent international Yiddish literary quarterly, which he edits to this day. Barbara Harshav is Senior Associate Editor of The Tel Aviv Review and a prolific translator from Hebrew, French, German, and Yiddish into English. Benjamin Harshav is Jacob and Hilda Blaustein Professsor of Hebrew and Comparative Literature at Yale University and former Director of the Porter Institute for Poetics and Semiotics at Tel Aviv University. The Harshavs were responsible for the highly praised American Yiddish Poetry: A Bilingual Anthology (California 1986). A. Sutzkever: Selected Poetry and Prose By A. Sutzkever University of California Press Copyright 1991 A. Sutzkever All right reserved. ISBN: 0520065395 Blond Dawn (19341937) Yankl Adler, portrait of Sutzkever for his first volume of poetry, Warsaw 1937. Away from the four walls, Where the traces of my footstep sear, Vast panoramas of granite Appear. Fiery rocks. Abysses deep. Music flows of melted gold: Beloved, your unknown name Will be told! I climb upward, climb Over steps of stone, over gorges in sight, To the blue gods of genesis In the height. My touch, in ecstasy, will melt The colors blue and violet On the face of a rock I etch My portrait. Strides and valor overwhelm me: My gaze from granite's face. I descend from rock to the earth, Enveloped in grace. White flame a veil on the mountains, My step silver echoes on the planet. Today I breathed my will Into granite. Here I am, blooming as big as I am, Stung by songs as by fiery bees. I heard you call me in the shining dawn And rushed to you through night and dust and sweat. Cities and villages tore off from me. Lightning set thin fire to my old, gray home. A rain washed away the red traces. And I stood before your name As before the blue mirror of conscience. Like flayed branches, my hands Rap hastily on your bright door. My trembling and baffled eyes, Like two sails, are drawn to you. Suddenly: the door is open. You're not there. Everything's gone. A poem left behind. Silly weeping. Incomprehension. 1935 In evening-gold, A barefoot wanderer on a stone Casts off his body the dust of the world. Out of the forest Darts a bird, Catches the last morsel of sun. A willow on the riverbank is also there. A road. A field. A quivering meadow. Sly steps Of hungry clouds. Where are the hands that create wonders? A living fiddle is also there. So what remains for me to do at such an hour, Oh, world mine in thousand colors? Just To gather in the knapsack of the wind The red beauty And bring it home for supper. Solitude like a mountain is also there. 1935 Autumn Dances Give me your hand, sister, I'll lead you To autumn. From its jug shall arise Flaming punch, we shall drink it until We grow ripe like the autumn, and wise. Over there on the hill lies a shepherd. A windwolf has devoured all his sheep. Sunglow freezes on his pale hands, At his feet, a tree bows deep. In the field a bright sheaf, embracing A lady sheaf, strolling by in the light A bridegroom leads his bride where a cloud Faithfully makes them a bed for the night. But a windmill is already grinding their sunset, Grinding legends, grinding the wind on the run, And paints with dream-color your brow Till you yourself go down in the late sun. Rolling stones shiver like lyres, Rolling words grow drunk and rancid. Let us scatter our cares in the field, Let