by Ilan Braun (Le Tour-du-Parc, Brittany, France)
Have you ever heard
On a summer evening
The violins and the cellos sobbing
While high in the sky
Swallows are dancing
A place where the bows on too tight cords
Are running up faster than life
Faster than death
Where grey-faced musicians
In spite of all
Smile to the children around
Where tears flow like streams
Stemming from springs
Believed to be forever dried up
Do you hear, still,
This light music?
Ilan Braun, a retired French journalist who wrote for L’Arche, says that “This poem was inspired by the tragedy of the Terezinstadt concentration camp.”
A poet, writer, painter and amateur historian on the Holocaust and post-war Jewish clandestine immigration to Israel, he has lived in Israel and Australia and visited over 30 countries.
You can read more of his work in Labyrinthe poétique: De la terre au ciel (Publibook, Paris, 2009) and in English (“The Oak of Tears”) in Under One Canopy: Readings in Jewish Diversity, edited by Karen Primack (Kulanu Inc. Silver Spring, MD. 2003).
For more information about his work, visit: www.ilanbraun.dr.ag
The Jewish Writing Project 