I Am the Rain - Selma Meerbaum-Eisinger

I am the rain and I pass
Barefoot from land to land.
The wind plays in my hair
With a brown and slender hand.

My thin dress of spider web
Is greyer than the greyness of grief.
I am alone. But here and there
I play with a deer for relief.

I hold strings in my hand
And, upon them, are strung
All the tears that ever
From a pale maiden's mouth have sprung.

I have stolen them all
From slips of young girls, late at night,
Who, hand in hand with their yearning,
Treading their tremulous way, quailed at the sight.

I am the rain and I pass
Barefoot from land to land.
The wind plays in my hair
With a brown and slender hand.

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Selma Meerbaum-Eisinger (1924- 1942) Ukraine
Translated by David Paley
Source: Poems without frontiers