Also in this issue, Lisa’s translations from the Hebrew of:
Sharron Hass
Admiel Kosman
Rami Saari
Lisa Katz’s electronic chapbook Breast Art
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Another poem by Agi Mishol may be found online at Mississippi Review Online
More work by this writer can be found in Poetry International #4 (San Diego State University 2000), and on the UN Dialogue Among Civilizations Through Poetry website pages 706-716.
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Email Agi Mishol
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Translator’s note: Thanks to the students of Hebrew University’s Literary Translation class, Fall 2001, for their help.
Agi Mishol
A Little Prayer for Sunday
Give me a break from flashing cops,
the HMO and the temples of social security,
from bookkeepers and the keepers of jargon,
temp agency clerks with helmet-like hair.
They’re been shooting here all morning;
the partridge hunters and the dogcatcher
roam my countryside.
Newspapers —
filled with black-fisted Orthodox men,
and high-strung poetry critics,
and openmouthed bulldozers —
fall like leaves upon my house.
Why is it such a big deal to yield
to a woman like me
who lets others cut her off on the roads.
I who lay me down to sleep with the hens
at the foot of the well-lit shopping malls —
Hear my prayer
Please don’t add me to the culture package today.
I who am not exempt from anything —
Grant me permission
to stay in bed
one more day.
Translated from the Hebrew by
Lisa Katz
