What folly my homeland has committed

Early 12th Century

About This Entry

These moving lines are extracted from a longer Hebrew lament over the death of the poet’s mother. Interestingly, at a certain point, a reader of this text (perhaps the later copyist) made emendations between the lines, reworking this poem into a memorial for the wife of a certain Samuel. This text offers an idealized portrait of a son’s mourning for his mother, cast as a dialogue between the dead woman and the poet.

Illustration of a bearded, crying man in a robe and turban, his head surrounded by a gold halo, crouching beside a shrouded figure, also haloed, lying on a wooden bed.

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Lament on the death of his mother.

[Son:] What folly my homeland has committed, for it has put away the glory of my lady!

It did not know that it was taking all its lovely things, when it took what I loved. [ . . . ]

Your departure is so hard for me, such that the fire of departure is poured out inside me!

I bewail your parting and give no rest to my eye, as I weep.

To whom have you abandoned me, O lady? Whom will you instruct to help me?

How will I find peace after you? When you left, all my respite left! [ . . . ]

Where are your acts of kindness, which used to help me in my times of disaster and distress?

Go slowly, O soil of the grave, lest you accumulate over my tender and delicate one!

I adjure you, O clod of earth, not to destroy my beautiful lady and princess,

for she is the mother of nobles and daughter of princes, and at the head of all queens she is my queen!

[Mother:] “My son, do not yearn to see my face, for my appearance and form have been ruined.

The soil has wasted my body away; the clods have destroyed the splendor of my image.

Since the beginning of my travails, I have understood that there is no balm for them,

and my soul has given up hope, for I understand that no healing will bring me out from this.”

[Son:] It pains me, O my lady, that you have gone; it pains me, my noble one, that you have departed!

You have been captured by the trap of death—you who used to be like my shield and buckler. You were among those who helped me

on the day our prince Mevorakh [my father] died, the day he left my community,

the day his shade over my head was gone, and my shade and protection were gone,

the day when I had so much anguish, the day I was so perturbed.

For this I make my head like water, I pour out tears like a river.

[Mother:] “Please, O you buried ones, pray for life, to send my wishes of well-being to my house,

To pray for the beloved son of my womb—how can he bear his yearning for me?

For parting with you is so hard for me; it is as hard for me as my death.

If only I weren’t surrounded by clods, I would get up and return to my home.

My soul is not used to bearing such parting; you [clods] have made me dwell all alone.

My soul was so frightened when I went down to the grave, and I was in dread because of my fear.

How have you let me lie in a desolate field, and destroyed my pleasance!

If only you [my son] would see how the splendor of my appearance has been destroyed, as I lie beneath the clods,

You would then call over me with a lamenting voice, asking how my home has turned to waste.

For yesterday I lay on linen blankets, and today I lie in cramped soil.

Yesterday you called me the sister of delight, and today I am called the sister of maggots.

Yesterday I dwelt in a spacious house, and now I dwell in the house of waste. [ . . . ]

Listen, my son, give ear to my command, listen and do not reject my instruction.

I adjure you today by the eternally living One, not to forget the day of my death.¹

Establish [a yearly anniversary] as a time to cry for me at my grave, with a bitter voice that will rouse me from my slumber.

I will cry down below, and you up above; I will moisten my grave with my tears.”

[Son:] If I forget your death, my lady, may my right hand forget my religious faith,

If I do not recall your memory forever, above my head joy² and happiness! [ . . . ]

[Mother:] “Let me sleep and rest, and may my eyes’ long sleep be as sweet to me as my gift.³

Then let me awake for my fate when princes and princesses awake, on the day of my resurrection.”

Translated by Gabriel Wasserman.

Notes

[Literally “the day of my reckoning, accounting,” i.e., the day when God took reckoning and ruled that it was her time to die.—Trans.]

[The poet is alluding to Psalms 137:5–7: “If I forget you, O Jerusalem, may my right hand forget [its abilities] . . . if I do not recall the mention of Jerusalem over my head joy (i.e., headmost, or chief joy).” For metrical reasons, our poet does not use the regular word for head, rosh (as in the biblical verse), but rather kodkod, “skull,” which makes the metaphor sound very strange.—Trans.]

[I.e., “the gift that I offered in life to you and to others.” The word minḥah also refers to a grain-offering in the Temple; obviously, the mother never made such an offering, since she lived long after the destruction of the Temple, but the line could mean that her long sleep should be as satisfying to her as a meal-offering was to God.—Trans.]