Warren Meredith Harris’ collection, The Night Ballerina: A Poem Sequence in Seven Parts, was
published by BrickHouse Books in 2012. His poems appear in The Hampden-Sydney Poetry Review, Pembroke Magazine, The Main Street
Rag, Ekphrasis, The Penwood Review (UK), The Anglican Theological Review, The Jewish Literary Journal, The
Howl, Edgz, Poem, Big River Poetry Review, freefall, Mobius: The
Journal of Social Change, Flaming Arrows (Ireland), and others. He
has held three fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities,
served as editor of a literary magazine, and written verse plays and
adaptations, some of which have been performed in Chicago, Virginia, and New
York City, including a broadcast on New York City public radio.
Night Life
 |
| Marc Chagall, The Cowshed, 1917 |
A steer's
head,
gigantic,
crescent-eyed,
projects
through the roof
of a
slaughter shed
into the
black and heavy blues
of the
star-speckled night.
Red spatters
an injured horn,
flecks a
corner of the eye,
stains the
window lintels.
A deep
bovine bellow
softens into
words:
"I see
the butchers
wiping their
knives on the grass,
the boy with
curly hair who whispers
he will not
taste of me—
though I
know he will!
I see
thousands of the Tsar's boys
beneath the
soil,
the Tsar's
troops, Russians and Jews,
in shallow
pits.
"The
butchers are praying
for an end
of it there,
by the banks
of the Stypa,
that our
village be spared.
They have
smeared my blood
on the
window frames,
and already
the death angel
has passed
by!
"The
night is alive.
I see
through the darkness
swimmers in
the starry river
and drifters
on rafts
between the
banks
of deep
turquoise hedgerows.
"I see
hidden
beneath the
distant roofs
some who are
whispering
over the
remnants of their supper
as the
little ones sleep,
some
laughing
between
swills of vodka,
or studying
Torah,
or weeping
over the Passion,
some
praying,
or washing,
or sleeping,
or making
music or love.
"All is
well. Enjoy this night
and savor
the thought of tomorrow,
when I will
be for you
the aromatic
feast
from the
roasting pot."
 |
| Marc Chagall, The Soul of the City, 1945 |
Two Women
White
spirit, swirl down
as trailing
gown, breasts,
and
hair-dark inward eyes.
Disembodied
face, breathe on me
breath of
the faded synagogue,
the dark,
snowy street,
and a dream
blue horse and driver.
Umber-haired
lover,
press to
your warmth
a willing
cockerel, so that I,
a lost Janus,
can again take brush
and make a
Jew crossed,
forsaken
until he gazes
on the
temple's fiery curtain.
Birth
Celebration? Too soon and hard in the large room with dull
orange walls. At a corner stand bearded
men, and one of them signing to skeletal faces outside a window with his index
finger up—it's a boy!
 |
| Marc Chagall, Birth, 1910 |
At an inside
doorway other men's heads line up like scrolls on temple shelves. Crimson curtains, deep, dark folds, hide from
their male eyes the blotchy-faced,
exhausted mother, still naked and bloody. An erect midwife displays the son, while a
figure — the father — peeks from darkness at the foot of the bed, pulls himself
off the floor, and speaks:
"Ah! What sounds!
What sights! Maybe a soldier gets
used to such things, not ordinary men. I
don't expect Eden. But this! Why, Lord?
Birth as scary as death?
"I'd
like to have a word or two with Adam.
Such a schmuck! To throw away the
Garden for a woman! Except for him, I
could be right now in the synagogue by golden lamplight studying Torah in
peace, making my point to Ezra and Moyshe (the blockheads), while back at home,
my new son would be arriving as easy as a loaf of bread from out of the oven —
no need for all this sweating and screaming and bleeding — and maybe dying.
"Did I
cause this? I only followed your words,
Lord. I found the joints of her
thighs—jewels indeed. And I got me to
the mountain of myrrh....
"Ah! So I'm a schmuck, too! Now I know what the old men mean when they
say, 'A man studies until he is seventy, and dies a fool.' So be it.
But if I could, I would spend the rest of my days only swimming in the
sea of Talmud!"
