Watch: My Father’s Death by Bracha Bdil

My Father’s Death – Lamentation for Soprano & Piano

Composer: Bracha Bdil
Words by: Pnina Avni
Translation: Rachel Baddiel
Translation editor: Yael Levin
Soprano: Mina Gligorć
Piano: Vanja Šćepanović
Sound production: Marko Perić

2021 “Portraits and Remembrance” Rossi Fest – The International Holocaust Remembrance Day Concert Studio recording, Concert Hall of the Belgrade Jewish Community building, Serbia, 2021

—

My Father’s Death

And at the end of the seven
days
He grew into seventy.

And my rooms are filled full
of him.
And my eyes –
His little girl again –
In this size
That intensifies
Inside
His daughter-fruit.

My Father, My Father
This terrible affront.
That so it is.

And my eyes –
In this greatness
Until the tearing.

All my days

I did not believe
This terrible affront.
That so it is.

And when he died
I did not salt-stand
In my tears.

We went.

At the front –
Four undertakers
Strict indifference
In their work as usual
The bridegrooms of his cold stretcher.
And for a moment
the edge was exposed
His foot in the white shroud.
Alas, the mystery code.

Glorified.