Category Archives: poetry

January 20, 2025 · 7:30 am

Self-Exile

by Herbert Munshine (Great Neck, NY)

To me, a synagogue should be 

an exclamation point, 

standing tall and straight, 

reflecting strength and confidence 

but, instead, it is a question mark, swirling 

and broadcasting insecurity. 

The confusion brought to me by

the Hebrew chanting and the davening 

saddens me, for I feel excluded amidst

the longing to belong, to share the unity

and the compelling desire to recognize 

our attachment and connection 

to our Greater Power. I am conflicted, 

ultimately lost. 

Even so, I feel an urge to walk inside,

to join the others who have worn 

the Magen David draped over their hearts, 

but I recognize that the ancient language 

spoken is a code, a kind of price 

of relevant admission, that excludes 

the likes of me. 

I find no Rosetta Stone handed down 

from Mount Sinai that will lead me 

to a satisfying translation of the wisdom 

which will assure me that I’ve found a home 

among those strangers. So I reluctantly eschew

entrance, step away from the well-constructed but

foreboding question mark, that of Chagall-like 

technicolor windows and impressive wooden doors 

and pews and platform, and stumble hesitatingly away 

on my solitary path, thinking of the lonely road 

through Jewishness that I have followed because 

He took my mother just one week before 

my 10th birthday many years ago. I dwell 

within an exile self-imposed. I try 

to fight it but I am left to wonder

just what might have been . . . .


Herbert Munshine grew up in the Bronx and graduated from C.C.N.Y. with both a B.S. in Education and a Master’s Degree in English. You can find his baseball poetry on Baseball Bard where he has had more than 100 poems published, and where he was recently inducted into that site’s Hall of Fame. He lives with his wife in Great Neck, NY.

1 Comment

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

Tagged as , , , , , , ,

January 6, 2025 · 7:30 am

I Heard My Grandparents’ Voices

By Esther Munshine (Great Neck, NY)

My grandparents stared from the portrait

Hanging on the wall — dead eyes, expressionless

I used to fantasize that they were somewhere 

Still out in the world, lost, but rescued at the

End of the war, not murdered horrifically, lost in

The mingled ashes at the hell that was Auschwitz

I dreamt that they were survivors who would

Miraculously be found so we could be reunited

Leave it alone! My hope was the naivete of a child

And then the discovery more than half a century later,

My mother’s papers:

Letters from Vienna during the war from

My grandparents to their children and a brother and 

Two sisters caring for my mother’s 

Mother — a tragic figure old and lost

My great-grandmother, an invalid with no words

She couldn’t speak English and I am

Not sure she even knew where she was

From my mother’s closet, several letters from

Her parents, hidden from us in her lifetime

Being read at our behest

In the vocally halting translation by a woman who

Struggled to decode the high German no longer in use

I heard the voices of my grandparents trying to

Encourage the Jewish children they had sent to the safety

Of loving arms in America

They spoke, sending regards to other relatives and friends

I knew well

Having grown up with — making my family suddenly full

Our two central figures included

Finally, part of me in a way that I could keep them forever

They had saved me too by sending their children 

To America…

But they were hiding behind window shades

In their once comfortable Vienna apartment

In terror they were suppressing while making small

Talk about daily life revealing true devotion to 

Each other and their children — hoping to be saved

Knowing they would do what they could to survive

Even as the chessboard of history was countering

Their moves, it was too strong

They used parental injunctions to their boy and girl

To behave and study well and to thrive

And there I sat and met my grandparents who were

Calmly discussing their household management

One time as if at a séance with spiritual intervention

Their tones alive with love; it was in that fractured moment

As if my dream had come true if only for that one–time

Visit — as if they had been merely misplaced in the fog of war —

As if they had survived

Esther Munshine started teaching when she was 20. Her career spanned 50 years, with a generous interruption to raise her family. In 2019, she began writing poems in earnest.  During the pandemic, she met online regularly with other writers sharing their work, safely at a distance. She was an invited featured poet to the second annual National Baseball Poetry Festival in Worcester, Massachusetts in 2024, where she read “Take Me Out” and “First Baseball Game for First Grandson”. “I Heard My Grandparents Voices” is an experience that their grand-daughter is still processing and she appreciates having the chance to share that experience with the community in the Jewish Writing Project. If you’d like to read more of the Esther’s work, visit: https://www.baseballbard.com and Reflections in Poetry and Prose 2023 https://www.uft.org/chapters/retired-teachers-chapter/retiree-programs/reflections-poetry-and-prose

4 Comments

Filed under American Jewry, Family history, German Jewry, history, Jewish, Jewish identity, Jewish writing, Judaism, poetry

Tagged as , , , , , , , , ,

December 16, 2024 · 7:30 am

On That Day

by Herbert Munshine (Great Neck, NY)

It rained that day. The gray sky 

matched everybody’s mood

and as my face was pelted 

with large, heavy drops that hurt,

I reassured myself that I would never cry. 

I was almost 10.

I stood lost in the crowd. I didn’t 

have a need to be up front

but someone nudged me, 

pushed me closer to the grave

and I looked down and saw

the plain pale brown coffin 

decorated with a matching 

Jewish star, the place in which

my mother slept (that was the current 

euphemism), and I was numb. 

An old man speaking through 

his beard, dressed in a long black coat, 

a rabbi whom I’d seen in my rare visits 

to Temple Emanuel in Parkchester when 

certain holidays occurred, said words 

I didn’t understand, made noises 

that offered a young child no comfort, 

and sporadically others, most of which 

I didn’t recognize because my family had chosen 

isolation as a way of life. He mumbled what I guessed

were prayers, and all I felt was the heavy rain that

seemed determined to replace the tears that wouldn’t come.

I paid attention to my heavy breathing 

because, I guess, it took my mind away 

from that pine coffin that held what was left 

of the woman who used to comfort and care for me 

when I was sick, who used to cook for me in her 

Jewish-Latvian way, from scratch to tasty,

with the constantly secret sacred ingredient 

being love.

I had been her companion as she prepared the food,

the one who licked the bowl … but what exactly 

was my role now that she was gone? Who would be

my mother? A little child needed a mother, but she was gone.

These thoughts bombarded my defenselessness

while wise men said their Hebrew words and still 

the tears refused to visit me, and the rain kept falling 

and the shovels lifted senseless dirt and dropped it 

on my mother and I felt like screaming and running 

to her but she was no longer there for me. Instead, 

the sounds replaced her voice, those holy sounds 

that meant nothing to a ten-year-old, 

a boy who simply wanted to hear

his mother’s voice again.


Herbert Munshine grew up in the Bronx and graduated from C.C.N.Y. with both a B.S. in Education and a Master’s Degree in English. You can find his baseball poetry on Baseball Bard where he has had more than 100 poems published, and where he was recently inducted into that site’s Hall of Fame. He lives with his wife in Great Neck, NY.

2 Comments

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

Tagged as , , , , , , , , ,

December 9, 2024 · 7:30 am

Our 35th Wedding Anniversary

by Julie Potiker (Sun Valley, ID)

Crammed onto a street corner in Ketchum, Idaho 

Across the street from the huge bronze moose

in front of Silver Creek boutique 

Draft horses pull covered wagons down Main Street 

Hands waving from wagons

Waving from horseback at the crowds 

Anticipating the arrival of the sheep

This annual event where they are the stars

Sprinting by the thousands through the streets

On this bright day–October 8th, 2023–

Eyes squinting under the brim 

of my cowboy hat

I feel disconnected

As if I might float away

Like a lost balloon

My hand in my beloved’s

keeps me tethered

to the land

Hundreds of families

Grandparents, parents, children 

Babies, fully engaged in the parade

Not noticing I’m weeping inside

How is it they are unaffected by 

The hundreds of Israeli families—grandparents, 

Parents, children, babies, butchered

burned tortured stolen raped, now at war?

On our 35th wedding anniversary 

I’m trying to hold it all — the joy and the sorrow–

Because this too is happening

This too.

Julie Potiker, a former attorney, is a friend of animals and the earth, a certified Mindful Self-Compassion teacher, and founder of the Balanced Mind Meditation Center in La Jolla, California. She is a member of the teaching team at UCSD Center for Mindfulness. Her published books are Life Falls Apart But You Don’t Have To: mindful methods for staying calm in the midst of chaos, and SNAP! From Chaos to Calm, both available on Amazon and Audible. Her upcoming book is a poetry collection of mindfulness poems. She lives in San Diego, California. Visit her website to learn more about her and her work: https://mindfulmethodsforlife.com

Leave a comment

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

Tagged as , , ,

December 2, 2024 · 7:30 am

Dogtag

by Harriet Wolpoff (San Diego, CA)

A moment of panic

What’s that guy saying?

Can’t understand him 

He’s getting closer

He’s pointing at my chest

Is he a hater?

Oh, says he’s Israeli

Whew

He’s offering to help

Put my groceries 

In the car

Because

He saw my dogtag

I love him!

Harriet Wolpoff is retired after several years in the New York City public school system and a forty year career in Jewish education in San Diego, winning many awards for ground-breaking programming.  She has been studying Israeli poetry with Rachel Korazim for over four years. Harriet is proudest of being a wife, mother, and Bubbe of three grandchildren who inspire many of her poems.

1 Comment

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

Tagged as , , , , ,

November 25, 2024 · 7:30 am

Lighting the Sabbath Candles

by Miriam Bassuk (Seattle, WA)

I can still see my mother lighting

short white candles in a silver

candelabra every Friday night

to usher in the Sabbath, to welcome

the Sabbath bride. Later that night,

our kitchen would grow dark, 

save for those flickering lights.

Over the years, that tradition fell away 

with a whisper I hardly noticed. 

Still, there’s something cellular,

deep in my bones that connects me

to generations of women, 

hands waving three times, covering

their eyes as they say the prayer. 

I feel their hum and sway, and realize

the link to this tradition grows 

ever diluted with each new decade.

Though I no longer feel drawn

to light candles on Friday night,

this memory stays with me as sacred. 

Miriam Bassuk’s poems have appeared in Snapdragon, Between the Lines, PoetsWest Literary Journal, and 3 Elements Review. She was one of the featured poets in WA 129, a project sponsored by Tod Marshall, the Washington State poet laureate. As an avid poet, she has been charting the journey of living in these uncertain times beyond Covid.

3 Comments

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

Tagged as , , , , , , ,

November 18, 2024 · 7:30 am

I Said the Words

by Herbert Munshine (Great Neck, NY)

I said the prayer for a very long year
to remember my mother
(as if I could forget)
to honor her
(as if I needed to)
to show my love for her
(as if that was the so official way
as if that could replace the feeling
fading just too quickly from my mind).

I journeyed to the synagogue
one vacant block from where my father worked
and sat with bearded ancient men
who shared a musty smell
with the hall which they inhabited,
who sought responsibility to guide the child
that I was and would forever be.

I listened to the words of the Kaddish
spoken quite precisely in a foreign tongue
a phrase at a time
and then I found myself repeating sounds
that had no meaning and no substance to me,
but it was my job, as I was told
(as if I had a choice).

And so I went, day by day, and I obeyed
and parroted the words
but never had the chance to say
the words that needed to be said,
about the ties we’d had, my mom and I,
about the caring that we knew
and love and strong security
now shattered — and the joy
of helping her whenever she put on
that apron and began to cook
from European scratch.

I said the words that were my duty,
words so alien to me
with men so distant from my needs
but with each word I mispronounced and mumbled
was the childhood-crafted
realization of what I no longer had
but needed very much.

I said the prayer
but wondered in my elemental way
why any God could be so cruel
to cleave a mother from a child
and substitute the words that had no meaning
to my soul.

Herbert Munshine grew up in the Bronx and graduated from C.C.N.Y. with both a B.S. in Education and a Master’s Degree in English. You can find his baseball poetry on Baseball Bard where he has had more than 100 poems published, and where he was recently inducted into that site’s Hall of Fame. He lives with his wife in Great Neck, NY.

2 Comments

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

Tagged as , , , , , , , ,

November 11, 2024 · 7:30 am

Devotional

by Miriam Flock (Palo Alto, CA)

His thigh thrown over mine,

my head nestled against his clavicle—

for thirty years, my husband never guessed

as he embraced me before sleep 

that I was praying: a hymn to that good Lord 

who forms our souls, pairs us in the ether, 

then hurls us into life, solitary 

until we recognize each other 

in the college cafeteria. Thank God, 

I say into my husband’s chest, 

his heart singing me to sleep.

Miriam’s work has previously been published in Poetry, Berru, Salmagundi, CCAR, and other journals.  She was the winner of the 2019 Anna Davidson Rosenberg Award for poems on the Jewish experience.  Her chapbook, “The Scientist’s Wife,” was published by Finishing Line Press in 2021.

Leave a comment

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

Tagged as , , , , , , , ,

October 28, 2024 · 7:30 am

Apple Strudel from Cramer’s Bakery 

by Julie Standig (Doylestown, PA)                      

Because it was Rosh Hashanah I was on the hunt

for good strudel and a mislaid memory.

Because of a trip to Poland, coffee and strudel

was a must-have at Café Mozart in Prague’s Old Town.

Because strudel and Eastern Europe are intertwined,

Rudy’s words, spoken long ago, come to mind.

Because he slowly stood up on our visit to Terezin’s

hidden synagogue to speak about his mother.

Because his eyes filled with tears as he recalled

the flaky pastry she rolled to cover the dining room table.

Because she crafted not only strudel but a tender memory

that Rudy clearly told at the age of eighty.

Because I left the bakery with apple strudel in tow, hands

tightly placed on the steering wheel, my wrists aglow in gold.

Because my left was adorned with the watch my father made

for my mother, and on the right, was a wide link bracelet once worn

by my Auschwitz surviving, parachute-making aunt.

Because these holidays always hold a mixture of salt and sugar.

Julie Standig’s poetry has appeared in Schuylkill Journal Review, US1 Poets/Del Val, Gyroscope Review and Crone editions, as well as online journals. She has a full collection of poems, The Forsaken Little Black Book and her chapbook, Memsahib Memoir. A lifelong New Yorker she now resides in Bucks County, Pa. with her husband and their Springer Spaniel. If you’d like to learn more about Julie and her work, visit: https://juliestandig.com

3 Comments

Filed under American Jewry, Family history, Jewish, Jewish identity, Jewish writing, Judaism, poetry, Polish Jewry

Tagged as , , , ,

October 14, 2024 · 7:30 am

Lord’s Prayer in Lebensgarten

by Miriam Bassuk (Seattle, WA)

Compassionate Listening Training 

between Germans and Jewish Americans

Lebensgarten – September 27 through October 7, 2002

Attic room full of light,

the Lord’s prayer written

in careful German letters 

on the back wall.

Vater unser im Himmel

Lebensgarten, once a munitions 

factory, now a community 

devoted to peace.

Our circle is thirty-five strong, 

half Germans, half Jews. We 

hold hands, pass the peace feather 

to speak what is most alive in us. 

Sounds of German translated to English, 

English to German. Make space for 

the wound, now layered by several 

generations, a curse that wants to be 

forgotten, yet keeps leaking out.

Together we move, the first grief cry,

afraid for so long to release it. 

Hold me sister, hold me 

brother. Embrace the child in me 

who still can’t understand.

Miriam Bassuk’s poems have appeared in Snapdragon, Between the Lines, PoetsWest Literary Journal, and 3 Elements Review. She was one of the featured poets in WA 129, a project sponsored by Tod Marshall, the Washington State poet laureate. As an avid poet, she has been charting the journey of living in these uncertain times beyond Covid.

2 Comments

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

Tagged as , , , , , , ,