This song cycle was written in 1998 for Voice, Violin, Oboe or Clarinet, and Piano. It is based on three poems by the late Israeli Poet Ya’ir Hurwitz. I used only three of the 18 short poems, all relating to death. This was his last book and he wrote these songs on his death bed. The entrapped bird is a metaphor of his soul being imprisoned in his sick body, waiting, in a sense, to be freed. I’ve tried to portray this dark and very painful atmosphere in my music using a chromatic and expressive musical language.