Monthly Archives: October 2021

October 25, 2021 · 9:12 am

Opposing Perspective

by Mel Glenn (Brooklyn, NY)

An educational administrator in


     11 million were murdered by the Nazis.


the Carroll Independent School District


     6 million Jews were slaughtered.


in Southland, Texas,


     1.5 million children were killed.


advised her teachers recently


     The Nazis came to power legally.


that if they have a book


     The earliest victims were people with disabilities.


about the Holocaust in their classroom,


     People around the world knew of the camps.


they should also offer the student


     Dachau was the first concentration camp.


access to a book from an “opposite perspective.”


     Eventually there were thousands of camps.


Of course, if such a book were available,


     The Nazis believed they would rule 1000 years.


it would never find the light of day,
having been burned and scattered 
among the ashes of the murdered millions.

Mel Glenn, the author of twelve books for young adults, is working on a poetry book about the pandemic tentatively titled Pandemic, Poetry, and People. He has lived nearly all his life in Brooklyn, NY, where he taught English at A. Lincoln High School for thirty-one years. You can find his most recent poems in the YA anthology, This Family Is Driving Me Crazy, edited by M. Jerry Weiss. If you’d like to learn more about his work, visit: http://www.melglenn.com/

2 Comments

Filed under European Jewry, history, Jewish, Jewish identity, Jewish writing, Judaism, poetry

Tagged as , , , , , , , , ,

October 11, 2021 · 6:40 am

Furniture

by Steven Sher (Jerusalem, Israel)

Before proposing, Grandpa Sam

bought furniture and Grandma Anna,

pragmatic, agreed to marry him.

That’s what passed back then for love,

the young torn from their families and homes,

fleeing Russia before the next pogrom.

A couple needed a proper bed,

a table and chairs, a dresser and sofa.

They even believed that sturdy

furniture would prop up any failings

in their feelings, that they could build

a life around it and six kids.

Sam died before I was born. Named after him,

I don’t put too much stock in furniture.

Anna outlived him thirty years,

the stern and proper widow

always sitting straight and proud

in an upholstered high back chair

before the family when we gathered

every week around the solid table

Sam had bought so many years before.

Steven Sher’s recent titles include What Comes from the Heart: Poems in the Jewish Tradition (Cyberwit, 2020) and Contestable Truths, Incontestable Lies (Dos Madres Press, 2019). A selection of his Holocaust poems, When They Forget (New Feral Press), is due out in 2021, while his prose will appear in New Voices: Contemporary Writers Confronting the Holocaust. For Flowstone Press, he is editing an anthology of Oregon poets. Steven lives in Jerusalem. If you’d like to read more about Steven Sher, visit his website: steven-sher-poetry.wixsite.com/writing

Leave a comment

Filed under Family history, Jewish, Jewish identity, Jewish writing, Judaism, poetry, Russian Jewry

Tagged as , , , , ,

October 4, 2021 · 6:25 am

The Hebrew Lesson

by Chris Farrar (Columbus, OH)

2:40 Friday. Workshop running over. Hebrew at 3:00. Enough time? Barely.

Sign off Zoom. Run, quick quick like a little bunny. What Mom used to say. Why thinking of that now? No matter. Bathroom. Glass of water. Snack? No time. Mow lawn? Ridiculous. But the grass! Tomorrow, tomorrow.

Get head into lesson NOW!

2:59. Sit down at machshev. Open Zoom. Which button? Four of them in front of me on the masach. Not obvious. What ferkakte engineer designed this godforsaken interface? “New Meeting”? Lo. “Schedule”? Lo. “Share Screen”? Absolutely lo. Ah. Process of elimination. “Join”! Ken, ken, ken!

Let’s see. Drop down box: “Meeting ID or Personal Link Name”. Move cursor to down-arrow using achbar. Will I see it? Sometimes there, sometimes not. Aha. “Ronit’s Personal Meeti”. Rest missing. Not problem, barur as the nose on my face.

Zoom wants password for Personal Meeti. Pull mikledet toward myself, type in password.

Ronit appears, smiling. Sits in white chair, blank wall behind. Shalom Chris!

Shalom Ronit!. I know what she’s going to ask, what her first she’elah will be. How did the week go for you? Same every week. Hate the question, never remember what I did.

Before can ask, I turn it around: Ech avar lach hashavua? Ha! How you like them apples Ronit?

Laughs, answers, tells me about her shavua. After this, no escape. My turn.

For once, not hard to answer. Remember, Ronit? Told you about spiritual writing workshop? Just got out of sednah al ktivah . . . ruchani? ruchanit? Oops. Noun-adjective agreement. Ktivah, “writing,” noun. “Spiritual,” adjective. Masculine or feminine? Ruchani or Ruchanit? Lightning-quick decision. Sednah al ktivah ruchani, I say. Wrong! “Ruchanit” she says. Should have known. Universe gave clue, I ignored it. This workshop all women, except me and Michael. Of course ruchanit. Men spiritual? Ha! Laugh inside at own joke. Linguistic joke. Appreciative audience of exactly one.

Conversation moves on. Lots of things to talk about from the sednah. Diane’s mother Jewish, child during sho’ah, hidden by Polish family. Elise in California, watching sun set, listening to my recording of kaddish yetom. Ruthie, the menahelet, profesorit be universitat Sewanee, new writing prompt every meeting, terrifying. Write a new and fresh ktivah every day? Help help help! Michael scratching his asshole. How to tell her in Hebrew? Rapid mental review of vocab. But who teaches “asshole” in language class? Wild guess: hu hitgared et pi hataba’at. Scratched the mouth of his ring? Seems awfully fancy. Success! She freezes, stunned. Hu be’emet amar et zeh? Ken, I answer, he really said that.

Pace picks up. Makshiv or sam lev? both same thing: pay attention. Decide makhshiv. More elegant. Slightly. She uses new word: tmichah. Quick, the root. t – m – ch.  Same as tomech, he supports. So, noun: support. Got it. Use it in my answer. Move on. Words following words, sentences following sentences; thunderstorm of meaning, each word  a raindrop pattering into place, perfect, distinct, blending together into magnificent whole.

Can’t believe can do this. Mind working like computer – meaning, tense, gender, mood, click click click. Would pass the Turing test – listener would think I’m human. Oh. Am human.

4:00. Shavua haba, ota sha’ah? she asks. Ken, I answer, next week, same time. Goes on my calendar. Need to continue. Not truly fluent. Fluent is not thinking, fluent is just talking, all on autopilot. Will be fluent some day? Perhaps. Will thrill go away? Maybe. Talking is just talking.

But talking in reborn language of reborn Israel? Nothing compares to thrill of that.

Lesson ends, exhilaration lasts rest of day.

Chris Farrar grew up in southern California, earned a doctorate in linguistics, and worked in technology marketing and, eventually, in data analytics. His first novel, By the Waters of Babylon, follows twelve-year-old Ya’el as she’s deported to Babylon after the siege of Jerusalem in 586 BCE. The novel is available on Amazon,  Barnes & Noble, Kobo and Apple Books. If you’d like to learn more about Chris and his work, visit his website: christopherfarrar.com.

Leave a comment

Filed under American Jewry, Jewish, Jewish identity, Jewish writing, Judaism

Tagged as , , , ,