More Poetry for Poetry Month

Here's another that I always have trouble getting through. Perhaps a little maudlin, but wonderful nonetheless. Leah Goldberg's "From My Mother's Home", as translated by Ezra Spicehandler:

My mother’s mother died in the spring
of her day. And her daughter did not
remember her face. Her image,
engraved upon my grandfather’s heart,
was erased from the world of figures
after his death.

Only her mirror remained in the house,
grown deeper with age within its silver
frames. And I, her pale granddaughter,
who do not resemble her, look into it
today as if into a lake that hides its
Treasures beneath the water.

Deep down, behind my face, I see a
young woman, pink-cheeked, smiling.
She is wearing a wig. Now she is
hanging a long earring from her ear
lobe, threading it through the tiny
opening in the dainty flesh of her ear.

Deep down, behind my face, glows the
clear golden speck of her eyes. And the
mirror carries on the family tradition:
that she was very beautiful.

(Sorry again for no Hebrew; couldn't get the formatting to work. Will try to post it later).

More Poetry for Poetry Month

Sorry I missed yesterday. Two updates today to make up for it.

The first update is another poem, this time in honor of Yom Hashoah (Holocaust Memorial Day, coming up Sunday night). The poem is "Written in Pencil and the floor of the boxcar" by the Israeli poet Dan Pagis. Hebrew is original, English is my translation.

כתוב בעפרון בקרון החתום
כאן במשלוח הזה
אני חוה
עם הבל בני
אם תראוּ את בני הגדול
קין בן אדם
תגידוּ לא שּאני

Here in the transport
I am Eve
with my son Abel
If you see my older son
Kain, son of Adam
Tell him that I--

More Poetry for Poetry Month

Let's keep adding to our collection, shall we?

This is an untitled love poem, by Isaac Ibn Khalfon (translated by Raymond Scheindlin, from his collection Wine, Women and Death), a poet of the Golden Age of Spain. A good poem considering the season: spring, new love, and Passover, when we read the Song of Songs (or the Song of Solomon), one of the best-loved love poems. And who hasn't, especially as a teenager, played the role of the hapless suitor?

I skip like a gazelle at passion's call
To see my love, secluded in her hall.
Arriving there, I find my darling in,
With mother, father, brothers--all her kin.
I take one look and grimly shrink away,
As if she didn't matter anyway.
them I fear; but her, my love, I mourn
like a mother mourning her first born.

Poetry Month! Sing a new song unto God!

April is poetry month, so I'll be looking at some favorites. The first comes from Jorge Luis Borges by way of Norman Tidi Giovanni's translation, titled "Israel".

Feel free to share favorite poems, songs or prayers that have moved you over the years, Jewish or not.

Israel

A man imprisoned and cast into a spell
A man condemned to be the snake
Who keeps watch over infamous gold.
A man condemned to be Shylock
A man bent over the earth in hard work
Knowing that once he stood in Eden
An old man with his eyes put out who will bring down the walls.

A face condemned to wear a mask,
A man who in spite of man is Spinoza and the Baal Shem and the Kabbalists.
A man who is a Book
A tongue that praises from the depths
The justice of the skies
A salesman or dentist who spoke with God on the mountain top
A man condemned to be the object of ridicule
The abomination, the Jew
A man stoned, set afire,
Asphyxiated in death chambers,
A man hwo endures and is deathless,
Who has now returned to his battle,
To the violent light of victory
Handsome as a lion in the twelve O'clock sun.

The most important Jewish woman (almost) no one has heard of.

So I was starting my work on my thesis (on creative liturgy and piyyutim) and was banging around ideas with my advisor when he said "...and of course, the poetry of Ruth Brin."

Who?

Ruth Brin is, arguably, the most important Jewish liturgist (male or female) of the 20th century. You can't pick up a siddur from any of the non-Orthodox movements without feeling either her direct influence (e.g. one of her poems) or indirect influence. Without Brin, I would argue, there would be no Marcia Falk, no women's voice in liturgy today (which means no Kol Haneshama or Mishkan T'fillah), and we would be the poorer for it.

Am I being hyperbolic? Probably, but her influence is everywhere, and I'm an unabashed fan. Not long after this conversation with Dr. Sarason, I found an old copy of Interpretations in the basement of the Klau Library as part of a book giveaway. It was a gem of a book (you can find it as part of Brin's anthology Harvest, which is still available.

Interpretations , for those who don't know, is a collection of English poems Brin wrote in the 1950s as an interpretive response to every weekly Torah portion, plus all the holiday portions. Accompanying each is the text from the Chumash (usually Hertz) that she cited. There on the pages before me were the poems written by a fiercely, profoundly bright, worldly, Jewishly literate woman, the product of the midwestern Reform Movement (specifically, from St. Paul), a graduate of Vassar, a daughter of two immensely smart people, who was just as comfortable with the wilderness of Minnesota as the wilderness of Sinai. In every one was a hiddush, a new interpretation, interweaving the rabbis and a very modern viewpoint to create a fully accessible, poetic understanding of the sidre.

Needless to say, I fell in love with her poetry instantly. I've used her liturgically countless times, teach on her poetry all the time (or use it to teach the text), and always find new insight whenever I go back to these pieces as well as her other poetic works.

I've often called her a proto-feminist--she used masculine language for God, she only took up wearing Tallit and Kippah later in life, and her poetry often echoes with the issues of the 1950s more than today (atomic war, the still newborn state of Israel, the burgeoning Civil Rights movement, the aftershocks of World War II and the Holocaust)--but (like Penina Moise before her) she created and presented an idea of a fully engaged Jewish woman in congregational life: not only in philanthropic works or the education of children but in her own self growth, and in the liturgical life of the synagogue, something that I'm still amazed to see shuls struggling with today.

Ruth Brin died this past week--ironic and poignant for me, as I was about to teach on her on Sunday. I never had the chance to meet her (though I've talked to people who have). I pictured her as witty, sharp-edged (in the best sense), thoughtful.

Bahiya Ibn Pekuda wrote that "days are scrolls; write upon them what you want to be remembered." Brin has written a whole host of scrolls, and has added to the wealth of Torah. May she be remembered for blessing.