Ronny Someck
"My mother dreams in Arabic,
I dream in Hebrew."
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Red Catalogue of the
Word Sunset
A French poet sees a red sunset
And squeezes wine from the cloud
An English poet compares red to a rose
And a Hebrew poet, to blood.
Oh my country, a land fastening cannibal lips
To the sun's virginal throat,
My arms are oars of fear
And I, in the ark of my life, row
Like Noah to Ararat.
 In
Answer to Your Question:
When Did Your Peace Begin?
Ben Gurion'e wind teased hair hung
on the wall of the cafe near the transit camp
and next to it, in a frame just like it,
the doughnut face of Umm Kulthoum.
That was in '55 or '56 and I figured if
a man and a woman hung side by side like that
they had to be bride and groom.
Translated by Ammiel Alcalay
A Poem
of Bliss
We are placed on a wedding cake
like the two dolls, bride and groom.
When the knife strikes
We'll try to stay on the same slice.
Translated by Yair Mazor |
 Ronny
Someck is undoubtedly one of the most celebrated Israeli poets,
often referred to as a "young Yehuda Amichai." Born
in 1951, he was uprooted from his native Iraq when he was
four. Transplanted to Israel, Someck spent his childhood in
a transit camp for new immigrants. There he was surrounded
by music, the great singers Umm Kulthum, Farid al Atrash,
and Fairuz shouldering up against Elvis Presley and Billie
Holiday. No wonder he is so beloved in Israel. In what other
poet do we find Tarzan, Marilyn Monroe, and cowboys battling
with Rabbi Yehuda Halevi for the hearts and souls of Israelis?
Someck's poems are rich in slang and distinguished by staccato
rhythms, quick cuts, close-ups, and disturbing segues. As
in film noir, the sensations are of speed, danger, uncertainty.
His distinct Sephardi voice invokes the odors of falafel and
schwarma, the army with its supporting cast of recruits and
commandos, the bustle of southern Tel Aviv with its small
garages, shops, cheap restaurants, its gangs and its Arab
workers. He is also the troubadour of the lovelorn, with poems
that are hot, erotic, comic, tragic, agape at the wonders
of a tear and a tattoo and a snapshot and a bra and a scarecrow.
To read his poetry is to ride a runaway horse.
Ronny Someck is the author of eight books of poetry, and
his work has been translated into twenty-two languages, including
Arabic, Catalan, and Albanian. "The Fire Stays in Red"
is a recently published bilingual edition with translations
from the Hebrew by Moshe Dor and Barbara Goldberg (Dryad Press).
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