My Mother and the Oven
What did my mother
want from our oven?
She moved it around
every autumn –
dragged the oven from wall to wall,
from corner to corner,
made it higher,
lower –
the white oven stood
pale and silent.
The Gentile drank whisky
from a flask
and sang sad Slavic songs.
The clay was shining on his big hands –
I was frightened by his shadow on the wall
and by the white shadow of the oven.
Translated by Barnett Zumoff
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