Amir Or [Israel]

 

The Barbarians (Round Two)
 
It was not in vain that we awaited the barbarians,
it was not in vain that we gathered in the city square.
It was not in vain that our great ones put on their official robes
and rehearsed their speeches for the event.
It was not in vain that we smashed our temples
and erected new ones to their gods;
as proper we burnt our books
that have nothing in them for people like that.
As the prophesy foretold the barbarians came,
and took the keys to the city from the king’s hand.
But when they came they wore the garments of the land,
and their customs were the customs of the state;
and when they commanded us in our own tongue
we no longer knew when
the barbarians had come to us.
 
(Translated by Vivian Eden)
 
 
 
Orpheus Prayer
 
Death and yet more death, sand and more sand
We have stood in the square hungry to be
 
and, like mountain shadows,
covered the city with pictures of a waking sleep.
 
Was she there or wasn’t she? 
A stranger in my body, able and yet unable, I tried the air:
 
“How many more years will we walk these dead sands?” 
The mountain is glimpsed like a vision or a mirage. 
 
Sands move on underfoot  like a memory with no beginning,
and each place     is every place.
 
Does the way go up or down? Are you here, behind my gaze?   
Is my gaze there, ahead of me? Where have we come from?
 
Alone, the two of us have crossed vast marshes
on the slowly melting faces of the drowned.
 
For years we’ve been immortal.
In the attic, in Amsterdam, we saw terrible sorrow in the window.
 
How much longer shall we walk
between death and death, sand and sand?
 
A new past give us, a new death give us.
Give us this day the life of the day.
 
(Translated by Fiona Sampson and the author)
 
 
 
When I Came to God
 
When I came to God, I came blind.
I heard all around me the song of his longing,
his growl, his sigh,
his slaughtered lowing.
I touched with my palms his leaves, his down,
the breath of his mouth, his back
still warm.
 
When I came to God, I came naked,
tainted by his smell, voice, and handprints.
He was walking in the garden in the cool of the day,
he was expelled, a fugitive and vagabond.
 
When I came to God, I whispered to him
know yourself, and I hugged myself;
when I came to God, I came alone.
 
(Translated by Seth Michelson)
 

 
Author’s Bionote:
 
*Amir Or is widely recognized as a major voice in world literature. He is the 2020 Golden Wreath laureate and the recipient of numerous national and international awards, including the 2016 European Atlas of Lyric Poetry Award, the 2017 Blue Met Montreal World Through Poetry Award, the 2019 Homer European Medal of Art and Poetry (Brussels), the 2021 Ianicius and Władysław Reymont Awards (Poland), 2021 Shabda Guchha Award (New York) and the 2026 Orpheus Award (Bulgaria). Or was born in Tel Aviv in 1956. He studied Philosophy and Comparative Religion at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, where he later lectured on Ancient Greek religion. He has published fifteen poetry collections, the most recent being “Child” (2018) and “Thirst” (2025). His work has been translated into more than fifty languages and published in forty-eight books across Europe, the Americas, and Asia. In addition to his poetry, he has published two novels and twelve volumes of translations into Hebrew from Ancient Greek, English, and other languages. His selected poems, “Loot”, first appeared in 2013, with editions published in India (2017), Serbia (2017), Spain (2023), and the United States (2025). His selected translations, “From the Hebrew Side”, were published in 2017, and his selected essays, “Discourse”, in 2019. Or is the founder of the Helicon Poetry Society, the Hebrew-Arabic Poetry School, the Sha’ar International Poetry Festival, and the “Helicon” poetry review. He has served as a national editor for international literary magazines, as a founding member of international literary organizations, and as the national coordinator of the United Nations–sponsored Poets for Peace program.