Image courtesy of Wikipedia
A hundred cubits running wide,
Green and silver is the raiment
Of the Maiden of the Mists.
Rainbows strung along the edges,
Suns and snows and rows of foam,
Woven into plaits and braids.
Yo-ho!
Upon white cords,
Upon green bands,
Over stormy balustrades,
Leaps, besprinkles, the Maiden of the Mists,
Swims through glimmering bows of foam
The slender, slim and sinuous daughter of the mists.
[II]
Yearns the black forest,
Ten thousand years of lust,
Says the black, dense forest:
“Dance for me!
Fling open your green and silver raiments,
Tear apart the rainbows
And bare your form.
Mother-of-pearl thy breast,
White blossoms are thy loins.”
[III]
“Yo-ho, old forest,
I shall dance a dance for you;
Yo-ho, thou forest of black lusts,
I shall dance a dance for thee.”
On the green and gray stairway
Swings and sways the Maid of the Mists,
Chaste and laughing,
Nimble and pure,
Green and white,
Widely spread the trailings long,
All folds freely loosened,
All rainbows ablaze,
And leaps
To the deep roaring waters,
To the briskly roaring waters.
[IV]
“Yo-ho, old forest,
What of my thigh hast thou seen?”
“Yo-ho,
Whitest dust,
Snow and sun,
Pearls and crystals,
Veils and shawls—
Old forest of black lusts,
What of my loins hast thou seen?”
[V]
Whitest dust,
Sun and snow above
And an iris of rainbow
Dances the Mist Maiden
With the buoyant roaring waters,
With the sprightly roaring waters.
“Yo-ho, old forest,
What of my white thigh hast thou seen?”
Source: Jehiel B. Cooperman and Sarah H. Cooperman (selectors and translators). America in Yiddish Poetry: An Anthology. New York: Exposition Press, 1967.
Yehoash is the pen name of Solomon Bloomgarten. Read about Yehoash
Thanks to Sammy Hacker for bringing this poem to my attention.