God Hid His Face
Selected Poems of RAJZEL ZYCHLINSKY
 
Ibn Dagan of Andalusia

Ibn Dagan of Andalusia, 
the last Jewish poet
in the Spanish land,
in deep, blooming orchards
he kissed the face of his beloved. 
He sang: 
Flowers grow beneath your feet, 
you are beautiful like the sun, 
and like the morning star, 
you are the light of my eyes.

- Came the expulsion. 
All the Jews were driven out of Castille 
and Aragon. 
About what did he sing then, 
Ibn Dagan? 
Here history is silent. 
We know only 
that thousands set off wandering 
into the unknown distance. 
Thousands died of hunger, 
Thousands - of cold. 
Murderers slaughtered them 
and robbed them of their money. 
And those who survived
sat down by the side of the road, 
on the bare earth, 
and waited for the Messiah: 
He was expected to come
in the year fifteen hundred and three.
 

Translated by Barnett Zumoff

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