Sea of Sepharad

By Mois Benarroch

"Mois benarroch is the best sephardi writer in Israel."

Haaretz

 

Published in Spanish in 2003, Sea of Sepharad explores the relations between the descendants of the expelled Sephardi community with the world of Judaism, Morocco and Israel.

 

 

Steps

My steps continue walking in Seville

go up and down on Levies Street

looking for my burned wife

in front of the church

while I was returning from Granada.

My steps keep on gouging the streets

day and night and they never stop they never part

of streets in which only my steps exist.

My steps procede marking Seville

its limits and its borders

its sky and its river

its tongue and its words

and when I laugh out loud

it's because I'm crazy

crazy from the past, crazy

of thoughts, crazy

of love.

 

 

 

 

Crutches

I leave you sailors of La Mancha

In black seas, I leave you and I go

don't throw me life jackets I know very well

to walk over these waters

I don't need your help

Neither for future mortgages

the waves are enough for me to ride

the odor of the oranges drive me to my land

and I am freer than all the freedom that you can imagine

stronger than all the help you try to give me

so that I walk on crutches

to later say that I don't know how to swim

not even to walk over the asphalt

on the wet grass of the morning

That's it, finally, I'm leaving

                               let it be clear

            I will not return.

Ever.

 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mois Benarroch
• Release date: Jun 23, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201302641

Mois Benarroch

"MOIS BENARROCH es el mejor escritor sefardí mediterráneo de Israel." Haaretz, Prof. Habiba Pdaya.

Book preview

Steps

MY STEPS STILL WALK through Seville

Up and down Levies street

Searching for my wife, burned

In front of the church

As I was returning from Granada.

My steps still tread over the streets

Day and night, they never part

From the pavements in which only my steps exist.

My steps still brand Seville,

Its limits and frontiers

Its sky and river

Its tongue and words.

And, when I fall into a torrent of laughter

It is because I am mad

Crazed by the past, demented

From thoughts, deranged

From love.

For whom do we write poems

No, no, no I tell you .

We don’t write

For the living,

We write for the dead

And for those yet to be born.

For the dead: to give

Meaning to their lives,

Their sufferings,

Their shudders,

Their deaths.

For those yet to be born: so that

They know that somewhere,

In a past of madness,

Some poem

Knew that they were all

Slaves,

Himself included.

Poem written kneeling down

THESE LANDS WHICH WERE ours,

Do not employ the labours of our children.

Some rely on pipe dreams,

Others on free love.

These lands which were ours

Do not give us grandchildren, instead they give us

Smoked peanuts

And other times that were once ours.

The ones who least understand us,

Are yesterday’s revolutionaries

Who say that we must suffer,

So that their tenets can be preserved.

Tomorrow will be another day, tomorrow

Another port will be flooded

With waters of waves of fire,

With words, ancient like the sea.

Crutches

I LEAVE YOU SAILORS of La Mancha,

In black seas, I abandon you and depart.

Do not cast towards me any lifeline, I know all-too-well

How to walk these waters,

I need neither your aid

Nor future mortgages.

The waves are enough to help me walk.

The fragrance of oranges guides me to my land

And I am freer than any freedom you might conceive,

Stronger than all the help you try to offer me

So that I walk with crutches

And then you can say I do not know how to swim

Or even walk on pavement

Or over the damp grass of early morning.

That’s it, at last I leave

let me be clear

I shan’t come back.

Never.

Pain

PAIN COMES TO KNEEL down,

But it is the soul that cries out

For the dead

And those who are to die.

The friends, sons, wives,

Lives lost, wasted.

On the wind, ships devoid of wings

Lives lost forever.

Sons not born, grandsons not coddled

Entire worlds, Abels unknown,

Possibilities that cannot unfold.

The pain comes to the head,

But it is the world that cries out

Through our bodies,

Weary of so many useless lives.

Remembrance

If poetry is remembrance ,

What are memories?

Where are your eyes

Brother,

Which I remember

So brown?

Where is the view

Of our faults

Our idiocy

Preconceived notions

And useless deaths?

I write against oblivion

Mostly

To not forget

What I remember.

Broken bottles

Iwas born where the Mediterranean

Reaches for the Ocean,

Desperately

Trying to escape,

Carrying with it an expired message.

I was born wondering:

Then, where does the ocean come from?

The first Benarroch of Tétouan

THEY SAY THAT THE FIRST Benarroch of Tétouan came from Fez

With his brother,

Who died on the way.

And he carried him on his back until they arrived,

So that he would be buried as a Jew should.

And I carry my own brother on my back

Though he died at the end of the journey,

I carry my brother

Like one cherishes an old bottle of wine.

I have a long tale to tell

And it isn’t mine,

It’s the one of my dead

Who look at me as though they were pine trees.

The shore of the other