Unter Daye Vayse Shtern Translation by Sutzkever

Yiddish by Abraham Sutzkever

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Sutzkever

Beneath your white stars

Extend your white hand to me.

My words are tears

That want to rest in your hand. 

Look, their light is dimmed, 

And from the depths of my cellar

I have no way

To give you words that shine.

Yet I want, dear God,

To entrust what I possess to you.

The fire within me demands it,

The first within me - my days.

But in the cellars and the sewers

Murderous quiet screams. 

I run - higher - over rooftops

And I search: where are you, where?

Madness chases me

Stairways and courtyards full of wailing 

I hang -- a ruptured string

And that is how I sing to you.

Beneath your white stars 

Extend your white hand to me.

My words are tears. 

That want to rest in your hand.

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