Kohenet

By Tali Cohen Shabtai

You are willing to come
To Jerusalem
Where I kill myself
Every single day -

 

You can't live in a place
Where the Transfer is
Conceptually different
For you –

 

As much as you warned me
About America

Where people don't realize "
The difference between Poetry
And Song",

 

I want to go back to
Europe - where people live
By caricatures

You say you like Jews

 

You thought I came from
Those countries - where it is forbidden
To uproot
My Ghetto

 

So I am going to the hospital
What the hospital asks
Is one less lady
Who smiles.

 

Tali Cohen Shabtai was born in Jerusalem, Israel, and her works are translated into many languages. She is the author of three bilingual volumes of poetry, "Purple Diluted in a Black’s Thick"(2007), "Protest" (2012) and "Nine Years From You"(2018). A fourth volume is forthcoming in 2021.