Oversettelse - Hebraisk-Engelsk - - המוות הופך את כולנו למלאכים ומעניק לכולנו...

Maybe "were" instead of "had been"?

I thought it sounded more poetic this way, and even grammatically more correct (the Hebrew original literally says "where before we had smooth shoulders"

The past perfect tense in English is only used when there is a comparison between two different times in the past, as in "He told me his idea, but I had thought of that already." Both the "telling" and the "thinking" are in the past, but the "thinking" came before the "telling. But in this text there is only one past time: the "being". Actually, I like "... where before we had shoulders as smooth as the raven's claws", or "... where we used to have shoulders as smooth as the raven's claws".

BTW, aren't they called "talons" instead of "claws" when they're on birds?

the origin is very poetic, and I thought the translation should strive for it as well, hence the usage of past perfect. literature in general, and poetry in particular, are not required to conform to grammar in order to convey an idea.
you could actually change it to "had once been smooth" and it would even be better.
'talons' may be the correct biological term, but with ravens specifically 'claws' is a more abundant use (try googling it). the same way I decided to go with raven rather than crow (although crow would be the corresponding biological species) - it just sounds better in English.

The use of an incorrect tense does not make something sound more poetic in English - it just makes it sound like it was written by a non-native speaker.

As for talons/claws, I wasn't sure about that, so we can leave it as is.

I've edited your work, as that is sometimes part of my job here as an English expert and administrator. I've tried to make sure it sounds poetic, but is still grammatically correct.

do whatever you choose - you're the boss here.
however in this case I'd prefer that you open it up for another translator to tackle, since this is simply not the translation I gave.

The changes I made were not that extreme - I especially liked your idea of using "raven" instead of "crows" - I'd like to give you credit for that.

I would have written "Death turns us all into angels".
"grants us with wings instead of where once our shoulders were as smooth as a raven's claws."
all depends in the context, of course...

I don't see the difference, except that "grants us with wings" is grammatically incorrect - it should be "grants us wings".

CC: meigui