Rifkah Goldberg
Rifkah Goldberg, born in London 1950, educated at London and Cambridge Universities, has been living in Jerusalem since 1975. She has two sons and is married to the writer Shalom Freedman. A member of Voices Israel and the Israel Association of Writers in English, she has been published in prestigious journals in the USA and the UK. Also an artist, her oil paintings have been shown in Israel and overseas, most recently at the Israel Museum and the Jerusalem Theatre. She works as a freelance writer and editor.
The following works are copyright © 2008. All rights reserved. No distribution or reprinting in any form whatsoever without written permission from the author.
The Baby Sitter
“No it’s not a wrong number”
“He’s not here
And she’s not in either”
Picture the homely salon
My painting prominently hung
Arched wood-framed windows
Wicker shelves full of
A changing variety of toys
Tiniest shoes in the corner
Everything is familiar
Except the somewhat flat
Polite monotone voice
Whom I finally realized
Was none other than
The father of my sons
I silently put down the ‘phone
As I should have done forever
More than three decades ago
Two Russian Girls
Two sisters in black-and-white
In old frames proudly adorn parents’ salon
Bathed in bright Jerusalem sunlight
One with perhaps-chestnut
Straight hair around a not-so open face
Whom I have not and now never will meet
And you with a halo of blond curls
Topped by an over-large bow
Flashing the smile I know from the office
More disheveled now you sit in the corner
White-hair roots clearly showing
Feigned entertaining stance
Your small bright-eyed father sometimes
Chips in on cultured Leningrad when
He can keep up with his non-native tongue
Your mother in far-off Australia
Landed moments after your sister
Barely-past forty passed away
A typical small family of Russian Jews immersed
In the Hermitage, Kirov ballet and Shostakovich
Managed to make their ways to different ends of the earth
But could not escape
The throes of sickness
That tore them apart forever
