Grass, grass up to my knees!
Grow up to the sky
So that there won't seem to be
Any you or I

So that I will turn all green
And blossom to my bones,
So that my words won't come between
Your freshness and my own.

So that for the two of us
There will be one name:
Either for both of us - grass,
Or both both of us - tuwim.

Translated by Lawrence Davis

Wife

My husband is idle, is dumb and spends money.
He either stands still at the window or runs about town like a bunny.

He stares and he stares, at a tram, at the sky.
He mutters, he whistles: he rummages over the house like an amateur spy.

And then he reads books: he turns their pages at least.
There are books in the kitchen and cellar; folios mixed with the yeast.

But what is he thinking about? what does my husband mumble?
When he tries to speak he gets nervous: piles of words flurry and tumble.

In the evening he drinks, and I feel angry enough
When I see his dear eyes getting misted up with that stuff.

His eyes are misted. He takes one more dram.
He kneels down beside me and lays his head on my arm.
It is only then that I learn for the first time who I am.

Translated by Jerzy Peterkiewicz and Burns Singer