Kentucky

I. J. Schwartz

1925

Sensitive Content

This text includes derogatory terms for people of African descent. It provides insight into Jewish history; however, The Posen Library does not condone or promote oppression of any kind.

One

A. After the Civil War

Wide, open, free lay the land,

Extending to far horizons.

The sandy red tract stretches

Far and strange and lonely,

Bordered by low wild plants

And unknown herbs

With broad leaves. Free stretches of land

Not yet turned by the plow,

Untended thick succulent grass,

And humid woods here and there,

One tree grows into the next,

And root entwines with root.

From all this throbs, hot and strange,

An unknown tropical essence,

Of blossoming and decay.

Overhead, arched the sky, undulating and pink,

The evening sky of the south.

The whole landscape appears

Illuminated, bound

By red trees and rose colored plains.

From the blue eastern horizon,

Facing the burning west,

Across the red tract, the wanderer

Came with the pack on his shoulders.

Tramp, tramp, tramp, tramp, in the soft red sand.

Baked in flour-white dust

The tall bony figure bent

From head to foot—from the old bowler hat

To the hard, dried up boots.

The red, pointed beard bleached by the sun,

The eyes strained and bloodshot,

A world of worry in their red depths.

Tramp, tramp, tramp, tramp, in the soft red sand.

So came the Jew from afar into the unfamiliar,

His feet sore, his heart heavy,

A pack on his back, a stick in his hand,

Into the new, the free and enormous land.

The night set in—blue, wondrous.

At first colors merged,

Violet with blue and red.

Finally, one color engulfed the world:

A deep thick blue. Only in the west,

On distant black hills,

One dark red strip burned. And first stars,

Near and red, winked to one another.

With the onset of the Southern night

A great freshness arose:

The earth’s luscious moisture

And warm odors

Filled the blue, cool air.

It was like water for the thirsty,

Like strong wine for the weary.

He kept going and going and going.

Suddenly at the bend in the road

The village appeared before him.

From the blue quiet darkness of the wood and field

Sound, song, and red fires

Burst forth suddenly, unexpectedly.

People spilled out from all the low huts,

Kith and kin, around the fires

In the middle of the street:

Clapping on brass and tin, and whistling,

Strumming on banjoes and singing,

Dancing strange wild dances,

Every muscle of half-naked bodies shaking.

Wild, in the red glow of the fires,

The black faces gleamed

With eyes red and heavy.

The fiery home brew

Went the hot rounds from mouth to mouth.

Heavy Negro women with red earrings,

Rolling and swaying, hoarse and hot,

Slapped themselves on their hips, laughing.

Naked children, with heads of black wool,

Jumped over fires

Like wild, young forest monkeys,

And kicked clouds of dust—

Up to the black and reddened sky.

Big black dogs barked,

And fat cats ran around in circles.

Through the reddish-black haze, the Jew

Passed with his heavy pack.

It seemed strangely familiar to him,

Known from old times:

As if he, himself, many years before,

Lived through the same.

So he went through the red dust.

Strange dogs barked,

Black children called,

Heavy women laughed,

And red eyes followed him—

Until the red wild camp was behind.

He was on the black field where

The old low farm houses stretched.

Letting down the pack from his shoulders,

He knocked on the nearest door.

From the house came a commotion.

The heavy bolt was loosened,

The door opened carefully,

And in the black void of the door

A tall, white, masculine figure

Appeared, with the black barrel of a gun

Extended in front of him, and a voice,

A hoarse sleepy voice, hissed:

“Who are you?”

“A Jew, who seeks a place to rest his head.

I am worn out and weary from my journey.”

“How do you happen to be here?”

“I carry my business on my back. Night fell.

I am tired. My feet are sore. Let me in.

I’ll give your wife a gift from my pack.”

The barrel of the gun lowered,

The voice spoke out more softly: “Wait.”

Then a figure in white came out,

A burning lantern in his hand.

Raising the light up to the Jew’s eyes, he looked him over

From top to bottom and barked: “Come.”

He led him into the barn,

Pointed out a pile of hay,

And said with feeling: “Don’t smoke.

You may send the barn up in flames

Together with your pack and with the cows.

Take care.” He slipped out of the barn.

And locked the door after him.

B. A Night of Dreams

The stall was fragrant

It smelled of dry warm hay

And the sweaty odor of horses and cows.

The cow sleepily chewed its cud,

And the horse snorted, switching its tail.

Crickets chirped into the night—

Long drawn out monotones—stopped,

Listened a moment to the stillness,

And again chirped into the night.

From far was heard another song,

The sleepy beat of a banjo.

A luminous late moon ascended,

And through the open windows near the roof

The moonlight settled into small white boxes;

Wherever a box of moonlight fell

Onto the hay where the Jew was lying,

Each stalk of hay shone in relief

And looked like a strip of silver.

Fresh breezes moved around,

Blew in the Jew’s face and on his hands and feet.

As if his body were submerged

In fresh, cool waters,

His limbs relaxed,

Stretched out slumbering, oblivious,

And fell into a deep sleep.

The night stretched into eternity,

With pieces of broken suns,

With shreds of red, blue, and green stars

Floating in a chaotic sky

Of blue liquid.

From the bluish pale liquid

Thick greenish-red beams

Converged, forming

Rainbow rungs of a ladder

Whose top hung on nothing.

On the ladder were small black demons

With red, flashing, sharp eyes;

Up—down, up—down, they clambered.

Their bending, airy, thin limbs

Radiated from the black and blue liquid.

Reeling, turning quickly on the ladder,

Sticking out their long red tongues,

In a fit of loud wild screaming,

They badgered him and pulled his coat.

And then it dissipated.

A darkness settled on the world:

Thick, heavy, distinct, like black glass,

With red stars fitted into the blackness.

Suddenly out of the darkness

A forest appears,

A cold forest of gleaming guns

Advancing on him from every side

Blocking his path.

All his muscles strain,

The heart in his breast stops.

Suddenly, light and free and floating,

He lifts himself, swimming in the air.

His body dissolves—just a wave of his hand,

A movement of his foot, he swims, he swims,

And with his hand touches red stars

And pieces of pale cooled suns.

Through the long confusion of the night,

In the background of his weary mind,

His grief did not leave him for a moment,

His yearning homeward for his wife and child.

Every muscle craved sleep

As a thirsty man craved water.

Muted roars clamored to escape

From his constricted and anguished heart.

As a child complains to his father,

He complained to the Lord

Of all the worlds; he cried his heart out.

He recited Psalms with heart and soul,

With every bone, with his very marrow;

And he heard the melody,

The old solemn melody of Psalms.

Quietly, his tears flowed,

Escaping from tightly shut eyes.

Stubborn, fervent, the prayer struggled out,

The old prayer of Father Jacob

When he came to the alien land:

“Give us bread to eat, and a garment to put on,”

For him, for her, for his pale children.

As the blue morning approached,

And birds began to call,

His pained heart quieted.

He saw himself in a green field

Bathed in a tremendous light

It sprouts, it greens, it blossoms, it pours forth bread

With the powers of the first seven days.

And see! He has taken hold in the soil,

In the blackish, rich, wild earth.

He feels as if he drives roots into the earth

And the roots suckle the earth.

A tree, an oak, spreads wide

Its fresh young branches, covered with green,

Soft, fragrant leaves.

Birds twittering and nesting.

Fresh breezes blow on him.

Over him hangs a cool round sun

Which strokes and caresses him with thin rays.

Greenish-blue in the morning light,

He remains quietly in the hay.

He opens his eyes wide,

His heart beating loud with excitement.

From his heart a song comes out,

A prayer to the Lord:

“God of Abraham,

Of Isaac and of Jacob,

Who hast led Your servant

Here, and will lead me further,

It is probably Your will and Your wish,

To plant me in the wilderness,

To make known Your name among the nations.

Do not hide Your face from Your servant,

Lead me through danger and suffering and darkness

As long ago You led

Your chosen people for all of forty years

To the wished for and promised land. Amen.”

C. Morning

The farmer threw open the door of the barn

And into the cool stall burst

The reddish light of the rising sun.

Into the stranger’s eyes flashed

The new, unfamiliar, fresh world:

Blue skies and thick grass,

Distant woods under a green leafy crown,

Nearby fruit trees covered with dew,

White-washed walls of the house

Bathed in green up to its windows.

Quietly the woman of the house approached

In a yellow straw hat with a wide brim;

From her open tanned face and gentle eyes

She glanced at him.

Wearing a white cotton house dress

She sat down to milk the cow.

The white frothy streams

Sang and danced as they squirted

Against the bottom of the shining pail.

The air smelled of warmth and abundance.

The farmer led him to the well;

And when the stranger washed

In the cold, clear water, the daughter

Approached him with a

Coarse white homespun towel.

The little ones, fingers in their mouths,

Their blond hair uncombed,

Timidly followed him with their blue eyes.

They shifted positions like geese on little brown legs,

Pinched one another, pushed each other,

Until the farmer chased them away

And invited the stranger to his table.

Thanking him, the Jew explained

That first he must pray, he must praise God.

He wrapped himself in his prayer shawl,

A large one with black stripes,

Put on the little four-cornered boxes

With hanging black straps.

Man and wife and child stood motionless,

Astonished and amazed. The strange man

Turned his face to the wall,

Closed his eyes, and with fervor

Rocked, rocked his bony body.

Afterwards he washed his hands again,

Intoned a short prayer—

And only then began to break his bread.

He didn’t touch the meat.

He sat with his hat on,

And dipped black bread into the milk.

The farmer found his tongue.

He marveled at all the amazing things

Which he had seen for the first time.

He had, he said, traveled the world over

And had never seen and never heard such things.

The garment with the stripes he could understand,

But what are those boxes with the straps for?

And do all Jews pray exactly as he does?

At that the Jew smiled quietly.

A pious Jew, he explained, ought to do

As is written in the Old Testament,

As God commanded Moses, His servant.

The farmer, still marveling,

Insisted that he had never,

Until that day, heard of such things.

After the meal was over,

When the Jew closed his eyes

And again began to murmur quietly,

The farmer gave his wife a wink:

A pious man, he keeps on praying.

After the initial surprise had passed,

Everyone felt more at ease.

The farmer expansive, cheerful, lit

His short black pipe, and the Jew

Beginning to talk, unburdened himself.

He came, he said, from hell, from a city

Where people do not live, but fall under the yoke.

He suffered in that big, wild city.

He was a tailor fifteen hours a day,

Confined in a narrow hole

Without a drop of air, without a bit of sunshine.

His flesh started to shrivel

And every bone in his body sensed death.

His heart began to grieve

For himself, for the years of his youth.

And he, living, grieved

For his orphans

Whom he had not seen for years

While wandering in search of bread.

So, with a pack, he set out on the road.

Here, at least, he has the open sky,

The world is wide, and people good;

A Jew does not get lost, as they can see.

Quietly, sedately, the farmer kept on puffing,

Covering himself with curtains of smoke,

Putting a word in here and there,

While his wife wiped her eyes.

“That’s all,” said the stranger, “A Jew lives with trust.”

He believes that God will not abandon him either.

And what does he desire: riches? money?

He wants only to reach the shore

And know that this is the place of refuge

God had destined for him. He is tired.

His every limb craves rest,

A roof of his own, a corner of his own.

He yearns to work in the sweat of his brow.

Does he look for more than a piece of bread?

He has wandered the length and breadth

Of the great new world. The land is rich,

It is fresh and young. The people are rough

But beneath their shells beat

Good hearts with compassion for strangers.

He saw how Jews,

Settling among Christian neighbors,

Engaged in selling products of the land.

They buy a skin, a bundle of wool, furs

Metals—plentiful here—they trade.

They work diligently and make a living.

The farmer sat quietly and thought,

Looked into the Jew’s weary face,

Slowly stood up from his seat,

Knocked the gray ash from his pipe,

And patted him upon the back:

“Don’t leave now, Jew.

I am going to meet with neighbors today;

We’ll talk things over, then we’ll see.”

From the threshold the farmer called to his wife:

“Do not let the Jew budge from this place.”

D. The End of the Pack

As the day drew to a close

And the slanted red rays fell,

The neighbors gathered.

Stout farmers arrived

With coarse calloused hands,

Ruddy faces and necks.

All wore baggy white pants,

Shirts unbuttoned, open on the chest,

Wide, straw hats on their heads.

The only one who was distinctive

Was the tall thin pastor

Dressed in black, every button

Fastened up to his neck. Behind the men

Came the quiet devout women

With thin drawn lips;

Reserved and hushed, only their eyes

Spoke eagerly and quickly,

Sliding from one face to the next.

They sat down on the porch,

The men separate and the women separate.

Immediately there rose,

From each man a puff of smoke.

(But no smoke came from the thin pastor.)

The hostess brought from the cellar

A heavy crock of cold apple cider

Bubbling up to the black rim.

She went around with eyes averted

Serving the smoking guests.

The Jew, stranger that he was, sat quietly.

Alien, he sat among the unfamiliar crowd.

Shyly, from the corner of his eyes, he looked

At the heavy bodies and necks,

As oaks rooted in the soil,

He felt helpless and weak

He sat forlorn, preoccupied,

His head down, his neck bent,

Not daring to raise his eyes.

Softly, the host started

To speak: “Neighbors”

“I told all of you about the Jew.

Here he sits, a stranger among us.

What can we do for him?” At this the pastor,

Quiet and sedate, spoke out:

“First, let’s hear from the Jew,

And then we’ll see.” They agreed

And they all grunted “Right, right.”

So the Jew told his story anew.

Above all else, they were touched by the sorrow

Crying out from his eyes,

By the frequent sigh which accompanied

The foreign pronunciation, the strange intonation

Of familiar words. The sorrow

Of the lonely, homeless man was

In every tone, in each unintelligible word.

And when the Jew stopped talking

Everyone sat quietly a while, their heads

Bent in the red evening light,

Heart talking mutely to heart.

Although they appeared hard as iron,

Their hearts still responded to suffering

For they, themselves, in early childhood,

Had known the taste of loneliness and sorrow.

They heard from fathers and from old grandfathers,

The first pioneers, of the life and death

Battle with the red man,

Of sleeping with a gun in hand for fear

Of sudden fires and tomahawks.

The sorrow of the lonely stranger

Touched the brave, silent hearts.

Now the thin pastor stood up,

Stroked his pale, high forehead,

And clearly, slowly, started to talk.

He began with the patriarchs:

With Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,

He told of Joseph in the alien country,

Of the prophet Moses with the Ten Commandments,

Of old King David with the Psalms,

Until he came to the son of God,

The lord, Jesus Christ. “Because of that,”

He concluded,

“Open your door to the stranger who knocks.”

One of the neighbors began,

Old Tompkins, with the face of a lion,

Hair, brow, and beard gray:

“My old barn and the house by the pond

Are standing empty, neglected. Let the Jew

Move in there and do business

I won’t charge him any money for it.

Later, if he can, let him buy it.

I’ll sell it cheap.” “Good, that’s good,”

The host thanked him kindly.

“But what do we do about the old place

That is in danger of collapsing?

We’ll kill our Jew yet,”

He quipped. “I’ll give lumber,

As much as is need to fix up the house,”

The lumber merchant said.

“We’ll fix the house and the barn,”

They spoke up from every corner.

“But we need money to carry on a business,”

The host persisted.

“If I sell the merchandise in my pack,

I’ll have enough,” put in the Jew.

“Fine, Fine, a good idea, no need for a better one.

Hey, mother, let’s have the pack over here.”

And in reply, the pack appeared at once

And was unpacked

Onto the white world crept

Blue, red, pink, green

Knitted jackets for women,

Dresses of the most flaming silk,

Tablecloths with blue and red squares

And heavy, thick golden fringes,

Striped colored shirts for the men,

Pipes of golden amber,

And heavy silver watches like onions,

Long strings of glass beads

In gaudy rainbow colors,

White silvery pocket knives

With green tinged steel blades,

Sea-shells, mother-of-pearl, bone,

Green and pink playthings for the children,

All kinds of beads and eyeglasses.

And over this, as if suddenly on fire

A large, red, sun flamed.

The people squinted

And protected their eyes from the flames.

They looked at each other astonished,

Dazzled by the scream of colors.

Later they smiled into their whiskers.

Their wives continued to sit quietly,

Like geese, they craned their necks from afar,

Their eyes blazed.

“Hey, women, now it’s your turn. Come

Show your stuff.” So the women,

Sedate and quiet, came over,

At first with restrained movements,

But soon, as if they were at a fair,

They became more animated and cheerful,

Their eyes bright, as if on fire,

Their voices lively,

Their hands working deftly

As each one made a pile for herself.

The hostess was flushed,

Bustling, running among the customers,

Coming often over to the Jew

To ask the price of an article:

“Tell me only what the thing cost you,

And I’ll set the price for them, myself.”

The Jew sat ashamed

Among the smoking, joking men.

It got darker.

The excitement and merriment

Set with the sun.

The women, quiet once more,

Retired again to their corner.

The faces became earnest,

They got up, began to yawn,

And quietly prepared to leave,

The men led the way, smoking their pipes,

The women walked behind with their new linens.

The men slapped the Jew on the back:

“What is your name?” “Joshua.”

“Fine name.

From now on we’ll call you Josh.”

And they withdrew into the night.

E. In the New Land of Canaan

On a fresh, clear, summer day

The loud banging of iron reverberated.

The spacious yard was full of scrap:

Pieces of old, rusty iron,

Thousands of dusty old bottles

Which sparkled silver and green

In the glare of the hot summer sun.

A dozen hens pecked in the yard,

And the aristocratic rooster with spurs

Proudly ordered them around.

The old barn was strewn

With rags, with paper, with horse bones.

The sharp smell of wet, bloody, salted

Hides assaulted the nose.

And a cloud of flies buzzed.

At the entrance to the yard, the old shack,

Propped up by slanting railroad ties,

Looked young with its sparkling windows,

And smoke blowing from its new chimney.

In the shadow of the old barn

Were two bent figures:

A big black man knelt,

Half naked, his body glistening, his red tongue

Clenched between his teeth.

He gripped a piece of iron in his hands;

The Jew hit the iron,

Swung the heavy hammer and banged,

And every time the hammer fell

And struck the gray iron,

The Negro jumped back

Without taking his heavy red eyes

From the hammer flying in the air.

The Jew’s face was tanned

His tapered bronze beard blackened

By dust. For all that, his eyes

Had acquired a new radiance.

His tall, pale, silent wife,

Wearing her dark wig, often

Ran out of the house to look for

Little Yankele. Now he is perched

On the high pile of iron,

Not knowing how to climb down,

And now he takes a walk on the narrow beams

Of the high, old barn; he jumps into the wool

Turning somersaults. He could break his neck.

And often she finds him, of all places, on the neck

Of the tall, stout, glistening Negro.

He sits on the Negro’s shoulders, and drives him on,

He kicks him with his small brown feet,

And jabbers in a strange tongue.

The Negro dances and runs around the yard,

And jumps, his black feet like iron,

On glass bottles and sharp metal.

The mother’s heart sinks, she trembles,

Lest that wild black man, forgive the thought, should,

God forbid, hurt her child.

Her husband watches this scene

But remembering another time in the barn,

He stands and looks in wonder and amazement

And sees in everything the hand of God.

Translated by

Gertrude W.

Dubrovsky

Credits

I. J. Schwartz, from Kentucky, trans. Gertrude W. Dubrovsky (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1990), pp. 29–44. Copyright © 1990 The University of Alabama Press. Used with permission of the publisher.

Published in: The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, vol. 8.