Tag Archives: l’dor v’dor

November 9, 2026 · 7:30 am

You Whispered through Your Death Certificate

by Barbara Krasner (Somerset, NJ)

You might have been coughing up a storm from your pneumonia. Nobody knew that you were ninety-seven. You’d been lying about your age for years. Why should the census enumerators know the truth? Was it their business? No. This doctor attended you for more than a week. His office was at 200 Fairmount and you were living with Bessie and her Adele at 240 Fairmount along South Orange Ave. He was not a Jewish doctor, but he was convenient, and maybe all the neighborhood went to him. It’s likely Meyer came from the Oranges and Max, your Mendel, came from across the river to see you. They probably visited every day. How did you get to live so long, more than twenty years beyond Mottel? You might have been in bed, immobile, for quite some time, because my research says your hypostatic pneumonia afflicts those who are elderly and bedridden. You must have known your end was coming.

Your death certificate says a contributing factor was senility. You’d earned your right to that after emigrating at sixty, three of four daughters predeceasing you, one other child you never talked about other than telling an enumerator you were the mother of seven but we only know about six: Doba, Malka, Hillel Meyer, Chaike, Mendel, and Hesia. 

What secrets, I wonder, were caught up in your phlegm. Did anyone notice Bessie was never pregnant and then one day showed up with a red-haired daughter? You loved that little girl as if she were gripped from the loins of your own daughter. Maybe because she was needed. Maybe because you all thought Bessie’s marriage might improve with a baby, that Paul wouldn’t drink so much. I cannot imagine the other secrets, but there must have been plenty. Anyone who could keep the sheitl tradition as long as you did is a good candidate for confidences and secret-keeping. I only wish your mother’s maiden name was here. When Meyer served as informant, I’m sure he wasn’t thinking about making the family history complete on this document. After all, he knew Michla. And did his grandmother’s maiden name matter? It does to me. Because what Meyer took for granted no longer has documented proof.

Barbara Krasner holds an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts and a PhD in Holocaust & Genocide Studies (HGS) from Gratz College, where she teaches in the HGS graduate programs. The author of two poetry chapbooks and three novels in verse, her work has appeared in Jewish Literary Journal, Tiferet, Minyan, Jewishfiction.net, Michigan Quarterly Review, and elsewhere. She serves as Director, Mercer County (NJ) Holocaust, Genocide & Human Rights Education Center.

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November 2, 2026 · 7:30 am

Lessons learned at the dinner table

by Annette Friend (Del Mar, CA)

I was raised to anticipate catastrophe.
Our kitchen table overflowed
with piles of food, dinners began
with appetizers, a half-cantaloupe,

or half yellow grapefruit,
a bowl of chicken soup
packed with carrots, celery and meat,
schnitzel, potatoes, green beans as main course,

apple cinnamon coffee cake for dessert.
I was fattened up before the next famine
could start.  Maybe tomorrow?
My mother’s hands always busy cooking,

teaching me I would never starve,
like she had in Poland, not here in America.
Every night after dinner,
my mother and I watched T.V. news.

Her blue owl eyes on constant alert,
muttering under shallow breaths,
“Is this bad for the Jews?”,
worried we’d be removed from

another promised land once again.
I was raised to know that within every
celebration lived a kernel of catastrophe,
like the fragile glass required to be broken

at the end of a joyous wedding,
reminding us of bitter disasters in the past.
I was raised with my mother’s fears tangled
around my unripe heart, my small hands,

afraid to untie the red ribbon of my future
already anticipating the catastrophe
coiled within the sparkling tissue paper,
waiting to be awakened, waiting to strike.

Annette Friend, a retired occupational therapist and elementary school teacher, taught both Hebrew and Judaica to a wide range of students. In 2008, she was honored as the Grinspoon-Steinhardt Jewish Educator of the Year from San Diego. Her work has been published in The California Quarterly, Tidepools, Summation, The San Diego Poetry Annual, The Jewish Writing Project, and the Paterson Literary Review. In August 2025, Annette along with artist Judy Langhoff published a book of ekphrastic poetry and paintings titled Pen and Brush: In Contemplation. She was honored to be chosen for third prize for her poem, “The Salvation of Books, Newark, N.J., 1959” in the 2026 Allen Ginsberg Poetry Awards.

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October 19, 2026 · 7:30 am

Eli, Eli

by Judith R. Robinson (Pittsburgh, PA)

eleven tolling 

orchestral bells 

as Elgar tries 

with eloquence

to grieve like a Jew

but the cello cries out

O God not again

as I do each New Year

for Akiva for Masada 

for the executed 

piled deep in pits

at Belarus and Rawa Ruska

for Chelm, Lelow, for Telz,

for the hundreds of shtetls

for Sobibor for Belzec

for the dozens of camps

my people incinerated ghosts

ash in the soil of Europe

O God, now for Pittsburgh

my city in America

for friends I knew

the freshest blood

for the Rosenthal boys

for the other innocents 

the eleven souls praying 

in the synagogue

for the eleven new dead.

*dedicated to the victims of the Tree of Life massacre, October 27, 2018

Judith R. Robinson is an editor, teacher, fiction writer, poet and visual artist. A summa cum laude graduate of the University of Pittsburgh, she is listed in the Directory of American Poets and Writers. She has published 100+ poems, five poetry collections, one fiction collection; one novel; edited or co-edited eleven poetry collections. To learn more about her and her work, visit her website: www.judithrrobinson.com 

Author’s note: The poem (and the painting which inspired the poem) are part of the permanent collection of the Rauh Jewish Archives at The John J. Heinz History Center of Pittsburgh. PA. Regarding the reference to Elgar, he was Sir Edward Elgar, a British composer who wrote some very moving, very sad music, such as the Cello Concerto in A minor, which is considered a masterful expression of grief, hence my reference to him as “grieving like a Jew.” Here’s a link to the Center if you’d like to browse through its collection: https://www.heinzhistorycenter.org/research/rauh-jewish-history-program-archives/

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September 22, 2026 · 7:30 am

My Sukkat Shalom

By Bob Canter (Monticello, FL)

A retiring teacher says goodbye to his long-time classroom

For years, I have had my personal “Sukkah.” It is a room in my synagogue. It is my Religious School classroom.

Not literally a “sukkah,” and certainly not a kosher one by the rules of how a real sukkah is to be constructed. My special sukkah is permanent, not temporary; no palm fronds or branches cover the ceiling, although I can see the stars by looking out the window. It has four walls, windows, and a door that I can shut and lock if I choose. It was there years before I arrived, and will remain years after I am gone.

Not exactly the kind of temporary structure our ancestors constructed in ancient days, and certainly not one with any kind of agricultural connection.

I do not “own” it, of course –- but then again – I do. I refer to it as “my” classroom, the same as a tenant might say “my apartment,” “my house,” or “my place.” You occupy it, you take care of it; you give it life, personality and purpose. It becomes “yours.”

It is my Sukkat Shalom, סכת שלום a shelter of peace.

Now, as I prepare to retire after 12 years of teaching in my current congregation and nearly 25 years as a Jewish Religious School teacher, I am savoring the last months in my Shelter of Peace. On Religious School days I arrive early – typically 45-60 minutes before class time. There is the obvious reason: To prepare for the day with photocopying and other routine duties. But I also use that time to sit and reflect. I recite the yotzer ohr יוצר אור blessing, which I teach my students, thanking God for a new day of life.

I am surrounded by, and immersed in, all things Jewish: Hebrew alef-bet charts and an Israeli flag adorn the walls. My classroom is packed with memories: photos, kids’ drawings, thank you notes and holiday cards my students made and proudly gave to me. Each one is a special memory and a humbling experience. I keep them all.

For me, my classroom is unique – there is literally no other place like it, nowhere else that can provide that level of comfort, peace, and serenity in a totally Jewish environment. It is my escape; my mental and physical sanctuary; a refuge of solitude.

***

On Yom Kippur we take a service break in the afternoon. During this time our synagogue arranges discussion groups. I have attended some in the past, but in recent years I have chosen to spend the service break time, typically 90 minutes, in my classroom, to sit, relax, and reflect on the meaning of the day. It renews me, physically as well as spiritually. I emerge stronger, ready for the afternoon, neilah, and concluding services, refreshed and renewed, perhaps, at least part, of what Yom Kippur represents.

***

No teacher literally “owns” his or her classroom. We are tenants. The “tenancy” may last one year or thirty, but inevitably it ends.

Now, after twelve years as a Religious School teacher, all in the same room, I have elected not to renew my “lease.” I’m moving on, and will clean out so the room will be ready for my successor, the next “tenant.” Some of the objects that provided me with so much warmth and reassurance, such as the Hebrew alef-bet charts, books, and maps of Israel, will remain, hopefully to provide my successor with the same sense of purpose and security that I found in that special room.

Of the many relics, the most valuable and meaningful to me is a simple handwritten sign, one that I made years ago when I first started as a synagogue Religious School teacher, a famous saying from the Pirkei Avot: “As you teach, you learn.” I took that statement to heart from the first day I read it, and I live by it every day. We never stop learning, and my students have been my best teachers.

I did not build it, but together with my students we infused that special classroom with an abundance of life and personality. My classroom is a center of Jewish learning, teaching, fun and connection with kids and their families; my “Laboratory of Jewish Learning,” where I worked to instill and reinforce a sense of pride in my students’ Jewish identity, will ensure in a small way, I hope, the emergence of the next Jewish generation.

The adornments are important, but it is the people – plural – all of us, together, בּיחד — that bring life and meaning to the Jewish classroom.

May every teacher find his or her classroom as a Sukkat Shalom, a true Shelter of Peace.

Bob Canter retired in May, 2026 after 25 years as a synagogue religious school teacher, first at Congregation B’nai Tikvah in Walnut Creek, CA, and the last 12 years at Temple Israel in Tallahassee, FL. Bob and his wife live in Monticello, FL, where he serves on the City Planning Commission and substitutes in the Jefferson County Schools. He remains an active member of Temple Israel, including serving as President of the Temple Brotherhood.

You can read more of his work here: Hebrew: The Metric System of Languages — Transparent Language.com ; For Once, I Didn’t Feel Like a Minority:; and on My Jewish Learning, where he’s written a variety of essays on Jewish life in the South and on lessons that he learned in his religious school classroom.

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September 14, 2026 · 7:30 am

To My Best Knowledge, Judaism Is

by Claudine Nash (New York, NY)

an ancient thread

dyed in modern colors

woven into our every action

and outlook,             

to my best knowledge, Judaism is

the comforting cloth

that warms me upon waking,

the string that ties me

to every Jew who ever

stood at the footpath

of the mountain. To

my best knowledge,

Judaism is the fabric

of my family, it is

the holiness laced into

our everyday moments,

our rituals, meals, music,

worship and sacred

times and seasons, to my

best knowledge, it is

the stranger welcomed into

our tent, it is a quilt

of blessings.

Claudine Nash is an award-winning poet who lives and writes in New York.  She has authored five poetry collections, most notably Beginner’s Guide to Loss in the Multiverse (Blue Light Press, 2020) which won the 2020 Blue Light Book Award.  She has also edited three poetry collections and is a practicing psychologist. Widely published, her work has been nominated for the Pulitzer, Pushcart and Best of the Net prizes and briefly travelled through space as part of the Writers on the Moon time capsule of contemporary writing. 

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August 24, 2026 · 7:30 am

Zayda’s Kiddush Cup

by Janice Alper (San Diego, CA)

The small silver cup was stowed
in steerage, it sailed across
an ocean to a new home. It
overflowed with red wine
every Friday night. Zayda’s
hand never trembled as he
mumbled the blessing to usher
in Shabbat. Now I hold it in my
hand carefully, as the wine spills
over to the sixth generation.

Janice Alper writes poems, personal essays, and memoirs. Her work has appeared in the San Diego Poetry Annual, Bristlecone, and California Bards, and other places. She is the author of Sitting on the Stoop: A Girl Grows in Brooklyn, 1944-1957. Janice is currently pursuing an MFA in Creative Writing/Poetry, from San Diego State University. Follow her at www.janicesjottings1.com

Editor’s note: “Zayda’s Kiddush Cup” was originally published on OftheBook (https://ofthebookpress.com) and is reprinted here with permission of the author.

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August 10, 2026 · 7:30 am

My Name is Chaim — Life!

By Herbert Munshine (Great Neck, NY)

We were Jewish when I was growing up,

American-style, New York-style Jewish,

the way our nearby kosher deli was kosher

but not kosher enough to be patronized by

the more religious Chasidim.

We patronized our local Temple Beth-El annually

on the High Holy days and smiled at all the strangers

in the fully seated congregation, pretended to

listen to the Hebrew prayers, imitated davening

with the others and nodded greetings of the day

when we all left to comfortably return to our

secular homes and apartments.

We knew that we were Jewish by the way we rooted

for the new-born state of Israel to survive the cold-

blooded attacks on its inchoate survival, by the way 

our friends celebrated holidays that others didn’t recognize, 

by the pride we felt when we noted the success of Uncle Miltie, 

the Three Stooges, the Marx Brothers and Danny Kaye, 

Red Buttons, Tony Curtis and Kirk Douglas — and rooted 

hard for Sandy Koufax (even as we privately kvelled 

in the memory of the grand accomplishments of the player 

and the man named Hank Greenberg, who, I later found out, 

had attended the same high school as I did).

My father didn’t make a big deal about religion,

never spoke about his European youth, and called me

Chaim (never once using my American name).

It wasn’t till my own old age (sixty years after he

found his forever home in Jewish Heaven)

that the wisdom came to me to comprehend

my Jewish-Yiddish name.

He had escaped the hell of his Polish ghetto and

had married a Latvian beauty of a similar escape and,

after they thought they were done filling our home

with loving girls, ten years later, I appeared, a son, 

to be loved without condition, a son who somehow 

represented life, a promise of the continuation, 

not so much of our Jewishness but of our name 

and our mystical — more than mythical — connection 

to Moses and David and our new heroes of the decade 

of my birth, with names like Herzl, Ben-Gurion, 

Eban, Dayan, Allon and Meir.

We Jews know well how to survive and thrive.

We understand the holiness and the value and vitality of life.

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.

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May 22, 2026 · 7:30 am

I Am Here Because

by Claudine Nash (New York, NY)

once I was standing

at the foot of the mountain

with every Jewish soul

who ever lived,

with whoever touched

the words of Torah

with silver yad

or daily deed,

because

no matter my age,

everyday

can be Shavuot,

everyday a re-receiving,

a re-reading of the world

through an ethical lens,

everyday

a new connection

to the Eternal,

to generations lost

and present,

to an ancient and

enduring chain

to which I am

a part.

Claudine Nash is an award-winning poet who lives and writes in New York.  She has authored five poetry collections, most notably Beginner’s Guide to Loss in the Multiverse (Blue Light Press, 2020) which won the 2020 Blue Light Book Award.  She has also edited three poetry collections and is a practicing psychologist. Widely published, her work has been nominated for the Pulitzer, Pushcart and Best of the Net prizes and briefly travelled through space as part of the Writers on the Moon time capsule of contemporary writing. 

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April 20, 2026 · 7:30 am

How My Father Shaped My Jewishness

By Herbert Munshine (Great Neck, NY)

My father never called me by what I call

my American name.

I was never Herbert, Herbie, Herb or even,

as a Scottish fellow teacher used to call me

during my time in West Africa for the Peace Corps,

Bertie. To my dad, I was always a very guttural “Chaim.”

I never questioned his choice.

(A Herb by any other name….)

To my teachers, my friends, my sisters,

I was Herb or Herbie but to my dad, I was consistently

Chaim. It was good and even comforting to be addressed

that way by him. In mature retrospection, I realize that

his use of the Hebrew name gave me my Jewish identity.

It’s as if he used the name to remind me of who I am:

a Jewish male, a descendant of a proud people,

a member of a not-so-massive group who love peace,

education, community, ambition;

a never-ending congregation whose members

represent the sacred holiness of life —

even in the face of constant enmity.

All this emanated from a name that has always

carried with it a truly deep meaning in the simple

yet complex translation: “Life!” In my final maturity,

as I reflect, even against my will,

I occasionally stumble onto wisdom

and realize the gentle options which

he offered up to me: Temple Emanuel visits

for major holidays, after-school Hebrew culture classes,

public school Hebrew language classes

(I won the Golden Ayin and was President

of the Hebrew Culture Club), two agonizing visits to

Jewish cemeteries. Even in the presence of death, I —

Chaim (my soul hears echoes of my father’s voice

together with a whisper of assurance from my mother) —

even in the midst of humbly resting Jewish souls

gone from one kind of community to

a much more peaceful one —

I am my father’s Chaim.

I am my lifetime definition

of a Jewish life!

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.

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April 6, 2026 · 7:30 am

Shabbat

by Penny Perry (Fallbrook, CA)

My six-year-old granddaughter

comes home from school

and declares, “Jesus saved me.”

My four-year-old granddaughter

echoes, “Jesus.”

“I need to tell them who we are,”

my daughter says.

My daughter found Judaism on her own.

I’m a Jew with Buddhist tendencies.

I pray to God and escort live spiders

from the shower to the grass.

My daughter gathers flour, honey,

eggs, oil, sugar, and yeast,

pours them in a mixer. The mixer hums.

She hums, lets the dough rise,

rolls the dough out.

She’s beautiful in her pink dress

and shawl, her hair tied back,

one loose curl.

She shapes the dough into four braids

and weaves them into a loaf.

She brushes the loaf with an egg wash,

bakes the bread to a golden brown.

She tells her daughters that all over

the world at sundown on Shabbat Jewish women

light candles. The candles she picks

are small with tiny flames. She places

each candle in a glass and puts them

on the cupboard. Each girl will have a candle of her own.

My daughter shows her daughters her book

of prayers, her Hebrew name embossed

on the cover. She says a prayer

in a language her girls have never

heard before. She asks them to close

their eyes and picture God,

says God loves them and will keep them safe.

I don’t tell my daughter that a friend

carries her flour and honey,

eggs and oil to the synagogue, 

where police in uniforms holster

their Glocks, guard the temple,

so my friend can bake and worship

in peace.

My granddaughters stand in their dresses,

their eyes closed.

I picture them as grown up mothers praying

in their kitchens at sundown.

I wipe my eyes, breathe in the scent of baking bread.

Penny Perry has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize six times, by six different publishers. Garden Oak Press has published two of her poetry books, Santa Monica Disposal and Salvage and Woman with Newspaper Shoes. Her poetry has appeared in many publications, including Earth’s Daughters, Lilith, Poetry International, San Diego Poetry Annual, Paterson Literary Review, Mid-Atlantic Review, and Limestone Circle. Her novel Selling Pencils and Charlie was a finalist in the San Diego Book Awards. She was the prose editor at Knot Literary Magazine for ten years. In the early 1970’s, she was one of the first female screenwriting fellows at the American Film Institute; a screenplay she wrote there became a film on PBS. 

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