Niagara in Winter by Meyer Ziml Tkatch

An overgrown thicket
With locks flowing wild,
With steam from the mouth
Which envelops the face,
With the haste of a shot,
With the roar of a forest,
Springs into the vale from a mount,
As though to break the neck
And to sprain the feet—
Niagara, the giant.

And the winter caprice
With its icy yoke
As in chase for a beast
Niagara pursues.
Not in vain howls the wind,
Like a pack of dogs,
And with the snow shot in vain
Shoots the cloud, shoots again,
Desolated all around,
All around becomes stoned,
As though him not meant.
Never, at all, stops
Niagara’s gallop.

Source: Jehiel B. Cooperman and Sarah H. Cooperman (selectors and translators).  America in Yiddish Poetry: An Anthology.  New York: Exposition Press, 1967.

Read about Meyer Kiml Tkatch

Thanks to Sammy Hacker for bringing this poem to my attention.