My uncles and aunts from the second district:
pointy beards and white ties,
heavy chains on high bosoms,
used to bring to the borders of the Seret[1]
train cars with provisions,
sermon-gifts,
candies for the kids,
the lilac of the Kaiser’s riches.
The aunts, like turkeys with excited necks.
The uncles attend to stroking their glass of tea
with intelligent hands
and tell tales of king (thanks be to him)
Ephraim Yossel[2], may your Jews intercede on your behalf.
Even at that time the little dogs would raise a leg
on your monuments in Vienna,
only your Jews overseas
have still not etched away
your good name.
I would uncork myself like a bottle
But the tribe admonishes me.
Vienna – dream city of Galician students
with pince-nez on their noses,
and little businessmen with trimmed beards
and eyeglasses with golden frames –
now you throw back in their faces
the coin they have exchanged.[3]
Now your Friday night is rattled
by spring,
by Jewish quarters,
by foreign customs officers,
by the shattered crystal of my
Galician legend.
Meyne feters un mumes fun zweytn bazirk
shtekhike berd un veyse kragens
shvere ketes oyf hoyche buzems
Flegn brengen tsu di breges fun seret
vagonen mit proviant
droshe-geshank
bonbons far di kinder
dem bez fun kayzers giter
Di mumes, vi indikes mit oifgeshroifte heldzer
Di feters flegn gletn dem gloz tey
it kluge hent
un derzeyln fun melekh ירום תודו
efroym yosl, zol zikh deyn yidn- שנאת far dir mien
shoyn demolt flegn hintlekh farhoybn a fisl
bey deyne monumentn in vin
nor deyne yidn meyver leyam
hobn biz heynt nit oysgekrukt
deyn gutn nomen
Ikh hob zikh gevolt farkorken vi a flash
Nor es mont der stam
Wien = khlum-stot fun galitsishe studentn
Mit tsvikers oyf der noz
Un sukhrimlekh mit tsugeshtitste berd
Un briln mit goldene remlekh
Itst varfstu tsurik in ponim
dos oysgetoyshte rendl
Itst iz deyn freytik-zu-nakhts zerudert
mit friling
mit yude פּאַרעקע
mit fremde zelner
mitn tzesplitertn kristol fun meyn
galitsishe legende
Second excerpt [with unresolved issues!] from Yehuda Leyb Teller’s Hitlers araynmarsh keyn vin. About his Galician Jewish family who lived in Vienna before the forced expulsion. In his collection of poems: Lider fun der tsayt (1940) Translated by A. Passmore. Written in Yiddish in the United States, Tellers Lider takes imagery from his journalistic reporting on Germany, Austria and Occupied Palestine where he traveled (illegally) in the late 1930s. See first post/ first half of this poem.
[1] River in contemporary Ukraine.
[2] Yiddish name for Kaiser Franz Josef among the Ukrainian Jews, cf. http://www.jewishgen.org/yizkor/Gorodenka/gor242.html
[3] The word here refers to a coin, but it also might mean borders (of Galicia being moved and bartered among other countries during WWI). It is an idiomatic phrase for religious conversion.