A cousin of renowned poet Paul Celan, Selma Meerbaum-Eisinger carved out her own legacy of literary significance despite writing all of her poetry before the age of 18. Tragically, the poet wrote all of her works at such a young age because she was deported from her native Ukraine and sent to Mikhailovka forced-labor camp during WWII and eventually succumbed to typhus.
Song of the Yellow Asters is mind-altering because to consider the dates and to read the collection reasserts the knowledge that looming in the background is the very present and grave atmosphere of an active and destructive war. The same landscape Selma writes about—where nature appears child-faced and sunlit— is also one in which tanks are leveling the earth and bombs are exploding.
Poetry provided solace for Selma amidst the foreboding atmosphere of Eastern Europe in the early stages of World War II and as she later was sequestered prior to capture. Each poem is dated, and though the collection is not ordered strictly by chronology, the knowledge moves closer and closer to the conclusion of Meerbaum-Eisinger’s life, creating a palpable tension. The immediacy and relevance act to amplify the meditations and craft of the book.
Song of the Yellow Asters is striking for its strong voice and well-crafted rhythm. It’s an astonishing achievement to consider how young the poet was when you read the collection, and that despite the efforts of the time to destroy the book, it has survived as a poetry of witness.
It’s a love letter-like arc to lyricism itself. Meerbaum-Eisinger’s matching of declarative emotions set against the natural world is charming; it’s the life of a poet wandering in intense contemplation. In today’s culture with hyperspeed feeds there is a great need to slow down; Meerbaum-Eisinger’s natural meditations provide that necessary pause. She displays an innocence paired with a profound poetic vision, each poem shining with an easy, meditative cadence.
You want to hear the violets grow.
-from “Late Afternoon”
The chestnuts, the birds, the fir trees, the namesake of the collection—the Asters—are used almost as instruments by the poet as she selects intriguing images and brushes metaphor and depth of feeling across the landscape. There’s a quiet observation but it’s bubbling underneath with a lively intelligence. There is also an ongoing sensuousness in the collection. In the poem “Rain,” we interact sharply with the intensity of the senses:
You go out. And the asphalt is suddenly wet and suddenly the green of the trees is new and a smell of fresh hay hits your face, which, hot and pale, has been waiting for this rain.
Carlie Hoffman’s translation of Song of the Yellow Asters is particularly significant because it bridges the gap between the original context and a modern audience. By bringing these fifty-seven poems into English, the translation recovers the poet out of the background of history and into the foreground of literary merit. The poems, originally ferried to safety by friends of the poet, exist as a singular portrait of a writer still entranced with their sense of hope and yearning vision, now preserved.