ON OCEAN’S BOSOM
(From the Yiddish of Morris Rosenfeld)
The awful wind, the storm with peril fraught,
Is wrestling with a ship upon the sea.
It would destroy her; she in sore distress
Cleaves the deep waters, groaning heavily.
The mast is cracking, quivering is the sail,
Frightful the water’s depths of roaring strife;
The wind contends and struggles with the ship
In fury, in a fight for death and life.
Now she is driven forward and now back,
Now she must stoop, now rise upon the main.
The ship is but a plaything of the waves
That swallow her, then spew her forth again.
The ocean roars, the billows lift themselves,
And awfully they thunder, lash and hiss.
The murderous storm seeks all things to destroy,
And opened are the jaws of the abyss.
Sighs, prayers are heard, for great the peril is,
And dreadful the distress. With suppliant breath
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