נוסח אנגלי מתוקן

Ehud Ben-Ezer

The Squirrel with the Map

of my Garden

Morning, a squirrel came to the green apple-tree

near my window

in my garden

and he climbed

climbed

climbed

till he reached a small apple

which was still unripe and sour

and begun to gnaw it

gnaw it

and gnaw it –

Then, when nothing was left –

He reached another apple

and gnawed it too –

Small green flakes

of apple-skin

from the unripe apples

of my apple-tree,

were falling down –

One by one

by one –

And then more

and more

and more –

Like many green drops of rain

on my grass –

"Aren't you ashamed

to eat my apples?"

I asked him.

"I have two answers to your question, Sir!"

He answered me very politely.

"Which of them you prefer?"

"Both!" I said, quite angry.

"O.K. the first one is –

Why do you think

you own the apples?

Are you the earth,

the sun or the rain?

They are growing 'your' apples!

And to my best knowledge

they have no objection

to my eating them-apples!

So why do you think that we,

the squirrels,

should starve in your garden, Sir?"

And even while he talked to me,

he was chewing one of 'my' apples,

dropping a snow of many green flakes

on my grass.

So, I smiled a bitter smile and ask:

"O.K. now what is your second answer?"

"I am not a simple squirrel!"

He seemed to be quite proud of himself.

"I am an educated one.

I have a map!"

And from his pocket

(he has a pocket!)

off he spread a map!

"A map!" I loudly laughed,

"Why do you squirrels need maps?"

"Don't laugh at us, Sir," he asked,

in a very serious mood.

"During the season we are not forgetting

to store nuts and small apples for time to come.

Probably you know that the off-season is lacking

any good fruits!"

And while he talked to me

he put an apple in his mouth,

the apple disappeared at once,

became a mini-bulge inside his cheek,

off the tree he came slightly down,

digging a hole in the brown wet soil.

Suddenly, the apple, from his mouth,

jumped strictly to the fresh deep hole,

and the Squirrel, using his small, efficient hands.

covered it with little clods,

"But why do you need the map?"

I looked at him and asked.

"Are you planning a weekend drive?

or visiting your sweetheart abroad?"

"Listen Sir," he said,

"it's not a joke, it's very sad.

We squirrels remember to store the fruits

but haven't enough memory

to remember where our hidden holes were!

So every off-season we dig and dig

to find the food that disappeared!"

"Now I know who digs those hills of soil

and ruin the grass and paths around!"

"Not me, of course, not me! Remember,

I'm an educated squirrel," he said.

"I have the map of your garden, Sir,

with all the real holes ahead!"

[where all the real holes inscribed!"]

Yarnton, Oxford, July 1998