"I do not think they will say 'Kaddish' for my soul when I am dead. And yet I am not a skeptic, exactly. I have a principle, Zionism. And beyond Zionism I have another great interest. I have now perfected Zionism, so I am free to pass on to Mysticism, in which I am deeply at work. The mystics are all bluffers. I am a mystic, but my mysticism is simple and plain. My aim is to present a perfectly simple view of occultism. It is difficult to persuade Americans to become mystics. They care nothing for Hegel and Kant. Their philosophy I call Barnumism."
Mr. Imber has largely given up writing Hebrew now, but lately he wrote a Hebrew poem comprising 200 closely printed pages. He did it, he said, to spite a man who said the poet had forgotten Hebrew because of his penchant for English.
Not long ago Mr. Imber wrote a _Last Confession_ in Hebrew. He was very sick in a St. Louis hospital with blood poisoning, and thought he was going to die. They wanted him to confess his sins. So he did it, in Hebrew verse, which he translated to me, evidently on the spur of the moment, thus:
When my day will come To wander in distress, Call the priest to my room, My sins to confess.
The sins which I have committed With deliberation, They will by the Lord be omitted, Who promised us salvation.
The evils I have done, Not conscious of the action, Have passed away and gone Without satisfaction.
I see near me the green table: The gamblers play aloud, And I am sick and unable To mix up with the crowd.
There are still beautiful roses, With aroma blessed; There are still handsome maidens, Whose lips I have not pressed.
This has me affected, I am full of remorse, That of late I have neglected The girl and the roses.
Written on what the poet thought was his deathbed, this satirical poem is almost as heroic as _The Watch on the Jordan_.
Mr. Imber has also written many original poems in English, which, however, he fears will not live. Many of them are satirical poems about American life and politics. When in Denver before the Spanish war he wrote some verses beginning:
Our flag will soon be planted In a land where we do not want it.
It was, the poet said, through the simple, clear character of his mystical attainments that he was able to predict the results of the war with Spain.