Kishinev Pogrom
In the Israel-Palestine conflict, I can clearly see that the Palestinians have right on their side, but I also understand Jewish pain. This poem is written in the voice of Hayim Bialik, inspired by his own poetry.
Hayim Nahman Bialik
a poet useless and anaemic
who only knows how
to wield words, not swirl swords
When danger was everywhere
I was there
Call it Kishinev, call it Chisnau
Call it Bessarabia,
Or call it Moldova
In the tsarist empire
Victims of wholesale ire
We Jews refuse to use
ruse or weapons
_ powerless against pogroms.
Pogrom? Russian for devastation
Massacre of Jews, pillages
ravages,
burning of our villages
rape and carnages
Why? Who can explain hatred?
Can you explain why the bean is green
do you even know why blood is red?
We are loathsome
all of us, not just some.
We’re despicable, detestable.
Daily the newspapers
treat us as lepers
call us Jews rapacious
always doing something
vile and atrocious
using our money and influence
to sow the seeds of violence
against the innocent peasant
Each and every Jew not just a few
is personally responsible
For the murder of Jesus
we are the cancer, the oozing pus
We commit blood libel
spread plagues and rabies
Slaughter Christian babies
and knead out matzos
with their blood.
We are usurers heartless
ruthless
charging huge interest
to poor Russian peasants
the world would be
a better place without us
the scab on the world’s anus.
On that Easter day in 0 3
God-fearing Christians
knowing that actions
not words were needed
to the city centre we speeded
armed with crowbars, and sticks
with bricks and stones
giving chase to the stinking rich
fat overfed Hebrews
inflicting gashes and bruises
breaking bones
gouging out eyes
killing forty-nine dirty swines
and raping six hundred Jewish whores
who were asking for it
to teach them a lesson
they aren’t likely to forget,
to tell them this ain’t bluff
that enough is enough
time our christian land to evacuate
time to go die somewhere or emigrate
go to America, go to Hell.
The tsar expresses his views
the fault’s solely the Jews’
they fill their pockets with gold
and drive the peasants young and old
to death by starvation in the cold.
Walk through the city of massacre
and with your hand touch and lock your eyes
on the iced brain and clots of blood
dried on the tree branches, rocks and fences
it is they
go to the ruins to the gaping breaches
shattered as though by thunder
concealing the blackness of a naked brick
A crowbar has embedded itself deeply
like a crushing crowbar
and those holes are like black wounds
for which there is no healing doctor
Everything is destroyed
And you will come up to the road
Acacias are blooming, pouring their aroma,
and their blooms are like fluff
and they smell as though blood
and their sweet fumes will enter your breast
beckoning you to springtime, to life.
The sun and the spring and the red massacre
That was one pogrom
there would be a thousand more
after my time.
And how did our soi-disant brave men react
to the black horrors against our race?
Did we decide to bravely face
our attackers and fight?
No, ma’am, we took to flight.
I said then and now I shout
Let there be no doubt.
Henceforth
We cannot afford to cross our arms
we need to seize with both hands our arms
and fight for our rights
