Even though i’m a bit of a mess right now, healthwise, I got myself together to go to Rony Someck’s 70th birthday party that was arranged for him at the University of Haifa the night before by Rafi Weichert. There was a huge audience, for the middle of an epidemic, and Rony was feted with readings of translations in numerous languages of his poems.
One of the most wonderful characteristics of his poems is that they are up to date. here’s a poem about teaching on-line:
Ronny Sommek
Zoom
I count the bears on R’s pajamas
from twelfth grade listening
to me reading a poem
about ballet shoes.
The teacher T’ in the next square
missed a hair above the left eye
when she tried to be exact
Plucking her eyebrows.
The beard of Teacher Y’
is more manicured
than the Gardens of Luxembourg
and the cat on the lap of H
deserves an embrace.
D’ judging by his shirt is a member
of the Nature Conservation Group,
And the flowers in the vase behind him
I identify as those permitted to pick.
K’s turtle-neck sweater is black and,
she looks like the raven in the old Scottish ballad,
And I hope that T doesn’t fix that eagle nose
that really complements her,
and while we’re on the subject of the nose:
The fact that P’ is the ideal
of painters of Aphrodite
that N’ is freckled
and H’ is too close to the camera.
She’s the last to turn off the video
and my eyes suddenly center on my own
the screen that fills
with squares of chocolate.
To me, the best part of the evening was the enjoyment Rafi had in arranging the surprise for Rony. Even though he was familiar with the Russian, Polish, Arabic, French, Rumanian, etc, he didn’t know about the Japanese translation at all. And when I finished reading an English translation and moved to a translation by Rivka Bassman in Yiddish, his jaw dropped.
Rony has had a huge influence on poetry of the next generation here, and he sees it as part of his role as poet, to teach. He’s taught in high schools, prisons, old age homes, and you can see that it’s out of love of the people as well as poetry.