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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=540400" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>On the Sea</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">I.<br>My God, break not the breakers of the sea,<br>Nor command to the deep, 'Become dry'.<br>Until I thank Your mercies, and I thank<br>The waves of the sea and the wind of the west;<br>Let them propel me to the place of the yoke of Your love,<br>And bear far from me the Arab yoke.<br>And how shall my desires not find fulfillment,<br>Seeing as I trust in You, and You are pledged to me?</div><div style="margin:10px 0">II.<br>Has the flood come again and made the world a waste<br>So that one cannot see the face of the dry land,<br>And no man is there and no beast and no bird?<br>Have they all come to an end and lain down in sorrow?<br>To see even a mountain or a marsh would be a rest for me,<br>And the desert itself would be sweet.<br>But I look on every side and there is nothing<br>But water and sky and ark,<br>And Leviathan causing the abyss to boil,<br>So that one considers the deep to be hoary,<br>And the heart of the sea conceals the ship<br>As though she were a stolen thing in the sea's hand.<br>As the sea rages, my soul is jubilant -<br>For my ship draws near to the sanctuary of her God.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">III.<br>To You my soul turns in trust or fear,<br>It is to you that she always gives thanks and worship;<br>In You I rejoice on the day I wander forth and flee,<br>And You I thank in every flight and wandering. -<br>Indeed, when the ship, to bear me over, spreads out wings like the wings of a stork,<br>And when the deep groans and roars beneath me,<br>As though it had learned from my own entrails,<br>And makes the abyss to boil like a pot,<br>Indeed, turns the sea into a pot of burning ointment;<br>And when the ship from Kittim comes to the sea of the Philistines<br>And the Hittites come down to the stronghold;<br>And when creatures press upon the ship<br>And sea-monsters watch for food,<br>And there is a time of trouble as of one that brings forth her first child,<br>When children have approached their birth<br>But there is no strength to bring them forth.<br>And though I should lack for food and drink,<br>I take the sweetness of Your name into my mouth for sustenance;<br>And I have no care for worldly goods,<br>Nor for treasures nor for any perishables -<br>Even so far that I can leave behind [in Spain] her that went forth of my loins,<br>Sister of my soul - and she my only daughter -<br>And I can forget her son, though it pierces my heart,<br>And I have nothing left but his memory for a symbol -<br>Fruit of my loins, child of my delight -<br>Ah! How should Yehudah forget [my grandson] Yehudah?<br>But this is a light thing compared to Your love,<br>Since I may enter Your gates with thanksgiving,<br>And sojourn there, and count my heart<br>A burnt offering bound upon Your altar;<br>And may make my grave in Your land,<br>So that it be there a witness for me.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">IV.<br>This is your wind, O perfumed west,<br>With spikenard and apple in his wings!<br>You come forth of the treasures of the spice traders -<br>You are not of the treasures of the wind.<br>You propel me on swallow's wings, and proclaim liberty for me;<br>Like pure myrrh from the bundle of spices you have selected.<br>How men must long for you, which for your sake<br>Ride over the crest of the sea on the back of a plank!<br>Stay not your hand from the ship<br>Either when day abides or in the cool breath of the night;<br>But beat out the deep, and tear the heart of the seas<br>And touch the holy mountains, and there will you rest.<br>Reprimand the east wind which tosses the sea into tempest<br>Until he makes its heart like a seething pot.<br>What shall the captive do, in the hand of God,<br>One moment held back, and one moment sent forth free?<br>Truly the secret of my quest is in the hand of the Highest,<br>Who formed the mountain heights and created the wind.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">V.<br>My desire for the living God has constrained me<br>To seek the place of the throne of my annointed -<br>Even so that it has not suffered me to kiss<br>The children of my house, my friends, and my brethren;<br>And that I do not weep for the orchard which I planted and watered,<br>Nor for my green shoots that prospered;<br>And that I abandoned Yehudah and Azariel,<br>My two beautiful choice flowers;<br>And Yitzhak, whom I counted as my child,<br>Fruit of the sun, best of the growth of my moons;<br>And that I have all but forgotten the house of prayer<br>In whose place of learning was my rest,<br>And that I forget the delights of my Sabbaths,<br>The beauty of my festivals, the glory of my Passovers,<br>And have given my glory unto others,<br>And renounced my praise unto graven images.<br>I have exchanged my abode for a shadow of shrubs,<br>And for a hedge in the thicket my strong bars;<br>My soul is satisfied with the chief spices,<br>And the scent of the thornbush I use now for perfume;<br>And I have ceased to walk with my face bending to the ground [in forced servility to other men]<br>But have set my paths in the heart of the seas -<br>With the ultimate goal that I may find the footstool of my God,<br>And be able to pour out my soul with my thoughts,<br>And stand at the threshold of His holy mount and set open<br>Towards the doors of Heaven's gates, my doors,<br>And suffer my spikenard to flower by the waters of the Jordan,<br>And put forth my shoots by Siloah.<br>The Lord is with me, how shall I fear or dread,<br>Since the angel of His mercy bears my weapons?<br>I shall praise His name while I still am alive,<br>And thank Him for eternity.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">VI.<br>I say in the heart of the seas to the quaking heart,<br>Fearing greatly because they lift up their waves;<br>If you believe in God who made the sea,<br>And whose Name stands for eternity,<br>The sea shall not frighten you when its waves rise up,<br>For with you is One who has set a bound to the sea.<br>VII.<br>I cry out to God with a melting heart and knees that strike against each other,<br>While anguish is in all loins,<br>On a day when the oarsmen are astounded at the deep,<br>When even the pilots find not their hands.<br>How shall I be otherwise, since I, on a ship's deck,<br>Suspended between the waters and the heavens,<br>Am dancing and tossed about?<br>But this is merely a light thing,<br>If I may eventually hold a joyous dance in the midst of you, O Jerusalem!</div><div style="margin:10px 0">VIII.<br>Call greeting unto daughters and relatives,<br>Peace to brothers and to sisters,<br>From the captive of hope who is possessed by the sea,<br>And has placed his spirit in the hand of the winds,<br>Thrust by the hand of the west into the hand of the east:<br>This one passes to lead on, and that one to thrust back.<br>Between him and death is but a step,<br>Yes, between them is merely the thickness of a plank;<br>Buried alive in a coffin of wood,<br>Upon no floor, with no four cubits of earth,<br>Nor even with less.<br>He sits - he cannot stand upon his feet,<br>He lies down - he cannot stretch them forth;<br>Sick and afraid because of the heathen<br>And because of the marauders and the winds.<br>The pilot and the mariner, and all their rabble -<br>They are the rulers and captains there.<br>Fame is not to the wise, nor yet favor to skilled men,<br>Save only to those that have skill to swim.<br>My face is troubled at this for a moment<br>(How should the innermost heart rejoice?),<br>Until I pour out my soul into the bosom of God,<br>Before the place of the Ark and the altars,<br>And bestow upon God, who bestows good things upon the unworthy,<br>The goodness of songs and praise.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>translated by Nina Salaman</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Yehudah+HaLevi">Yehudah HaLevi</a><div class=q>
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<script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=540400" data-title="On the Sea de Yehudah HaLevi" data-description="I.
My God, break not the breakers of the sea,
Nor command to the deep, 'Become dry'.
Until I thank Your mercies, and I thank
The waves of the sea and the wind of the west;
Let them propel me to the place of the yoke of Your love,
And bear far from..."></div>
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