UPDATE: One of my students wrote,”I think ‘Song of the Meadow’ or’ Meadow Song’ would be a good consideration for the title because a meadow includes grass and weeds, yet when you walk through the meadow you can see every blade of grass and every sprig of weed”.
What do you think ? What is your favorite English translation of the word עשב ?
Rabbi Nachman from Bratslav was a great grandson of Baal Shem Tov: he believed that through walking in nature the heart has the ability to open and one can pour his heart as written in Psalms 102:1, “and before God he shall pour his heart”. ”
ולפני ה’ ישפוך שיחו
The Song of Weeds
Behold thee
That every shepherd and shepherd
Brings out to life
his own special tune.
Behold thee
That every grass and weed
Has a special singing
of its own
And from the singing of the weeds
A tune of a shepherds
being made.
How beautiful
Beauty and pleasance
while we’re paying attention
to their sound
How good it is
To pray among them
and with a joy
to worship the Name
and from the the singing of the weeds
the heart fulfills and belongs.
And as the heart
from the singing is longing
and is yearning to the land of biggest joy
Great light
continues and growing
from radiance of the country for him
and from the singing of the weeds
A song of a heart is being made.
Music by Naomi Shemer, Voice Shuli Rand