THREE COLORS
translated from the Hebrew by Seymour Mayne
On Memorial Day I make my way up
to the small military cemetery.
In the northwestern corner
we’ve placed a grey basalt rock
and facing the southern corner —
a blanching chunk of chalk.
And between under the loose sand
our red loam
spreads itself all around.
And when the loudspeaker booms out
the memorial prayer
I close my eyes
and see those three colors
descend before me and disappear
into the encroaching shadow of the stones.
Elisha Porat, a 1996 winner of Israel’s Prime Minister’s Prize for Literature, has published more than a dozen volumes of fiction and poetry, in Hebrew, since 1973. His works have appeared in translation in Israel, the United States, Canada and England. Mr. Porat was born in 1938 to a “pioneer” family in Petah Tikva, Israel. In the early 1930’s his parents were among the founders of Kibbutz Ein Hahoresh, where Mr. porat was raised and still makes his home. Mr. Porat was drafted into Israeli Army in 1956, served in a frontline reconnaissance unit and fought the Six Day war in 1967, and the Yom Kippur War in 1973. A short story by him — On the Road to Beirut is also posted at Ariga. As a lifelong member of his Kibbutz, Mr. Porat has worked as a farmer as well as a writer. Mr. Porat currently performs editorial duties for several literary journals. You can write to him at porat_el@einhahoresh.org.il
Copyright © by Elisha Porat, All rights reserved
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