By: Elisha Porat

      Country:  Israel



Koalas in Hadera Woods

Translated from the Hebrew by Asher Harris





      Golden koalas dance there
      In the heights of the treetops, leaping in front of me
      And offering me their honey in flower-bowls:
      The sweetness of eucalyptus, delicate and smoky,
      And rosin that gives off the sharp scent of myrtle.
      They salute me in their slothful idleness,
      Hanging like memories in the thick wood
      That darkens before me, sundered out of my years.
      As if they know that I am hurrying now
      To the town railway station, to
      The renovated platform, to part from my dear ones:
      My beloved; my life; at the edge of the wood, opposite
      The dunes of Hadera West station.


      (c) All Rights Reserved.

      © Elisha Porat 2000.


Elisha Porat

A 1996 winner of Israel's Prime Minister's Prize for Literature,Elisha Porathas published more than a dozen volumes of fiction and poetry, in Hebrew, since 1973. His works have appeared in translation in Israel, the United States, Canada and England.

Mr. Porat was born in 1938 to a "pioneer" family in Petah Tikva, Israel. In the early 1930's his parents were among the founders of Kibbutz Ein Hahoresh, where Mr. porat was raised and still makes his home.

Mr. Porat was drafted into Israeli Army in 1956, served in a frontline reconnaissance unit and fought the Six Day war in 1967, and the Yom Kippur War in 1973. A short story by him -- "On the Road to Beirut" is also posted at Ariga.

As a lifelong member of his Kibbutz, Mr. Porat has worked as a farmer as well as a writer. Mr. Porat currently performs editorial duties for several literary journals.

You can write to him at porat_el@einhahoresh.org.il

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Comments: you'd better hurry or you will miss the teddy bear pik nik-
get those koalas mooovinggg!

Name: val magnuson
EMail: valmag@hotmail.com



Comments: Nice poem, concise, using just the bear necessities.

Name: phattkat



Comments: As usual, phattkat nailed it.

Name: RhymeMaster
EMail: JD@thewritersnook.com



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