Category Archives: Poetry

Celebrating Bob Dylan

13 Thursday Oct 2016

Posted by in American Politics and Life, Art, Poetry

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Upon awakening this morning following a full, demanding, elevating, affirming, and purifying Yom Kippur, I learned of the Nobel Prize for Literature being awarded this year to Bob (Zimmerman) Dylan, and I couldn’t be more thrilled.

It is said that the music of one’s youth and teen years remains a person’s favorite and default music for the rest of their lives, even if we evolve our tastes. For me, I grew up in the early to late ’60s loving Bob Dylan. His music was at once  personal to me and it was the voice of my generation in the midst of a cultural revolution in America.

I was told by a dear friend after delivering my high holiday sermons this year that I could not have spoken the way I did had I not grown up in the 1960s. Though I think my messages transcend my generation, in a way my friend is right. I have a certain orientation in the world reflecting values and politics that were forged in the 1960s after the assassinations of John and Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King, the civil rights movement, and Vietnam War.

Those were painful and confusing times for Americans and for me and my generation in particular (I was born in the closing weeks of 1949). I’ve carried those ’60s memories into my liberal politics today.

I am not a scholar of poetry, but Dylan’s verse has always moved me. I walk in my neighborhood 3 to 4 times a week listening to my favorite podcasts. When I tire of the spoken word, I shift to the music I’ve downloaded, and prominent there is Dylan. His poetry, syntax, melody, and voice lift me, offer me insight and provoke my thinking as only a great poet can do.

I regret that Dylan left Judaism for Christianity, as the press has reported, but I recognize that as an artist, he is forever seeking and breaking from convention.  I’m thrilled for the honor he has received.

Mazal tov Bob! Keep the music and poetry coming!

“All you need is love!”

04 Sunday Sep 2016

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Divrei Torah, Health and Well-Being, Holidays, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Poetry, Quote of the Day

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“All you need is love
All you need is love
All you need is love, love
Love is all you need…” (John Lennon – 1967)

Surveys indicate that we gravitate throughout our lives to the music and musical groups we loved when we were teens. For me, it’s the Beatles, Dylan and much of the classic folk music of the 60s, as well as Israeli music of the classic pioneer era. The Song of Songs was a popular source for much of that music, and perhaps, this is why my wife and I engraved on the inside of our wedding rings “Ani l’dodi v’dodi li – I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine.” (Song of Songs 6:3)

Attributed to King Solomon as a young man, the eight-chapter  poem expresses the passionate romantic yearning and love between two lovers. Tradition recognizes, however, that the Song is far more than a secular love poem. It is understood as an allegory of the eternal love between the people of Israel and God. Rabbi Akiva said of the Song when debating whether the poem would be included in the Biblical canon at the end of the first century CE: “For all the ages are not worth the day on which the Song of Songs was given to Israel; for all the Writings are holy, but the Song of Songs is the Holy of Holies.”

I recall the Song and particularly this verse because today is the first day of the Hebrew month of Elul in which the Jewish people begins a 30-day period of introspection and self-criticism leading to Rosh Hashanah. Today also commences a 40-day period that crescendos on Yom Kippur, the same period of time that Moses communed with God and received Torah (Exodus 34:28).

The verse – Ani l’dodi v’dodi li – evokes both this Hebrew month and the goal of our 30- and 40-day periods. The verse is an acrostic – the first letter of each word – Aleph – lamed – vav – lamed – spells Elul, suggesting that it is love that can lead us back to ourselves, to everything we cherish, to our families, friends, community, people, Torah, and God – “All you need is love!”

May this season be a time of turning, renewal and love for you, the people of Israel, and all children of the earth.

“How Can I See You, Love” – A Poem for Yom Hashoah

03 Tuesday May 2016

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Holidays, Jewish History, Jewish Identity, Poetry

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How can I see you, love,
Standing alone
Amid storms of grief
Without feeling my heart shake?

A deep night,
Blacker than the blackness of your eyes,
Has fallen silently
On the world.

And is touching your curls.

Come,
My hand will clasp your dreaming
Hand,
And I shall lead you between the nights.

Through the pale mists of childhood,
As my father once guided me
To the house of prayer.

by David Vogel, Translated by A.C. Jacobs. Holocaust Poetry, compiled and introduced by Hilda Schiff, publ. St. Martin’s Griffin, 1996, p. 14

Biography – David Vogel was born on May 15, 1891 in the town of Satanov in the Podolia region in the Russian Pale of Settlement. The family spoke Yiddish. In 1909-1910, he arrived in Vilnius as a yeshiva student. He worked as the caretaker of a synagogue and studied Hebrew. In 1925, he settled in Paris, where he wrote prose and poetry. In 1929, he and his wife, Nada Adler, immigrated to Palestine, where their daughter, Tamar, was born. After spending time in Poland and Berlin, the family returned to Paris. When World War II erupted, Vogel and his daughter fled to southeastern France where Nada was recuperating in a sanatorium. He was interned as an Austrian citizen and freed in 1940 when the Nazis occupied France.

Various stories circulated about his life after that. In 1944-45, the Hebrew newspapers in Palestine reported his “disappearance.”  He was presumed to have died in the Holocaust.

Israeli literary scholar Dan Pagis discovered that he returned to Hauteville after his release from internment camp. In 1944, he was arrested by the Gestapo, imprisoned in Lyon, and sent to Drancy, a transit camp for French Jews. Four days later, he was murdered in Auschwitz.

Temple Israel of Hollywood will commemorate Yom Hashoah on Wednesday evening, May 4 at 7 PM with the showing of the Academy Award Nominated Short Documentary “Spectres of the Shoah” about Claude Lanzmann, the director of the seminal 10-hour film “Shoah” commemorating the 25th anniversary of the film.

See http://oscar.go.com/nominees/documentary-short/claude-lanzmann-spectres-of-the-shoah

Two videos – one upon which to celebrate and one upon which to reflect

11 Friday Mar 2016

Posted by in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History, Jewish Identity, Poetry

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This first video will warm your heart and bring a smile to your face. It is a flashmob is at Mamila Mall leading to the Jaffa Gate of the Old City of Jerusalem. The song to which these Israelis, young and old, are dancing is a popular Israeli song from the early 70s with lyrics by Amir Gilboa and made popular by Shlomo Artzi.

The lyrics are:

Pit’om kam adam ba-boker
U-mar’gish ki hu am u-mat’chil la-le-chet
u-l’chol ha-nif’gash b’dar’ko koreh hu ‘Shalom.’ 

Suddenly a man wakes up in the morning
And He feels he is a nation and begins to walk
And to all he meets on his way he calls out ‘Shalom!’

http://www.youtube.com/embed/RzhQuQGyulA?hd=1

The second is a debate between Jeremy Ben Ami, the President of J Street, and Matt Brooks, the Director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, in Las Vegas. They discuss their very different perspectives on the Iran Nuclear Agreement, the 2-state solution, settlements, President Obama and his administration’s relationship with the State of Israel, BDS, Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton.

The conversation shows as clear a differentiation between J Street and the RJC as I have heard – I encourage you to watch the entire 90 minute debate.

You decide who won!

http://jstreet.org/BenAmiBrooks

 

Gratitude – A Poem for Parashat Yitro

29 Friday Jan 2016

Posted by in Divrei Torah, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Poetry

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How you lifted me
Upon eagles’ wings
When I despaired
I’d not recover
Nor swoon over grandchildren.

You swooped down
And plucked me from the pit
As a father snatches a child
From a dangerous sea
And a bird hovers over her nest
Turning tenderness into ferocity
When her fledgling is threatened.

In an instant I
Forlorn
Was restored to life.

So swiftly you came
Streaking across skies
To set me gently
Upon pinions
And shield me
From malignancy
And hunter’s arrows
From inert Sheol
And loneliness
Relentlessly beckoning
Like gravity on lead.

Higher than mountains
You lifted me
Insignificant and small
You robed in grandeur
Aided by healers
You attending from Your perch
Drawing me close
To them and You.

How can I repay them for my restored life?
How can I praise You?

Poem by Rabbi John L. Rosove – inspired by Exodus 19:4

Before and After Sinai – A poem for B’shallach

22 Friday Jan 2016

Posted by in Divrei Torah, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Poetry

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Eternal One
Was not Moses your intimate friend
With whom you spoke ‘Face to face’
Who You sent To Pharaoh
To diminish his name
That Yours might prevail over all the earth?

Was he not Your trusted Shepherd
Who stood before despots on Your behalf
And in humility before You?

Why did You betray him?
Moses suffered because he measured himself
Against Your image.

He was Your voice
Your extended hand
Your fingers touching
Water, air, fire, and earth.

You worked against him
Constantly,
Callously,
Using him,
Stiffening Pharaoh’s heart,
Showing You as the only One,
Reversing creation,
Devastating worlds,
Polluting waters,
Destroying crops,
Killing beasts,
Darkening the future.

You made him redeemer to lead the people
And drag them through salt water walls,
In mud and muck birthing them
As You drowned all of Egypt.

The people needed Your fist
But they didn’t change.
They complained at Meribah
Where You ordered Moses to hit the rock
And he did as you commanded.

Your strong hand and arm
Held close to Your breast
You fed them manna
And sated them from Miriam’s wells.

You brought them into the wild
Led them to Sinai
Gave them words
To be a holy nation
Your treasured possession
A nation of souls.

Years rolled by
Miriam died
The waters dried
The people complained
Again.

Moses was old
Tired and worn
Long past his prime.
You told him to speak to the rock
Out of covenantal faith
Permitting the waters to flow freely.

You knew his mind and his weariness.
You knew he would beat the rock
With his stick and water would flow
Surprised – You were enraged
And You denied Moses his dream
To enter the land.

Poor Moses
He did all you commanded.
He was your friend
But You consigned him away to a lonely death
On a lowly mountain.

We, his descendants
Await the day
When the Word will be stronger
Than the fist.

It will be a very long time
Far longer than 40 years.

Poem by Rabbi John L. Rosove

Flames Kindled – A Poem for the Shabbat in Hanukah

11 Friday Dec 2015

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Divrei Torah, Holidays, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Jewish Identity, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Poetry

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Flames kindled
This Shabbat-Hanukah night

Hanukah wicks flickering
Casting street-light

Shabbat flames dancing
Illuminating soul-sight

Hanukah – God descends
Shabbat – Jews ascend
Claiming every n’shamah
Sparks seeking light

Shabbat-Hanukah flames kindled
Lifting Israel
Burning bright
Glorious night!

Composed by Rabbi John L. Rosove

FORGIVENESS – Joseph and His Brothers

04 Friday Dec 2015

Posted by in Divrei Torah, Poetry, Stories

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I can’t stop dreams coming in the night
Even while awake I gaze towards light
My mother died my father sighed
And wondered about my dreams

Trusting a man along the way
I found my brothers lying in wait
To banish me from family and home
And send me far away

They could not utter even my name
They cast me down and spat me away
They broke my father’s heart
As they claimed I passed away

My name was written already in stars
But I became a slave and scarred
As flesh in a woman’s lustful heart
Who also cast me away

Her master incensed sent me to Sheol
But still a seer I glimpsed a glow
And blessings bubbled into my dreams
As I wondered about my way

Alas I was given a royal reprieve
And brought to a place beside the King
I served him long and faithfully
But continued to dream my dreams

My heart shut down over twenty odd years
My love poured into cold desert tears
I amassed great power and instilled such fear
While serving at the pleasure of the King

My brothers came their faces forlorn
Begging for bread before the throne
Thinking me Viceroy with scepter in hand
Not Joseph of their family clan

As my father re-dug his father’s wells
Seeing my brothers the waters swelled
Into my steeped-up and hardened heart
I opened to love again

I forgave them all and brought them near
Saved them from their desert fears
Settled them safely amongst their peers
As God intended all those years

  • Composed by Rabbi John Rosove

On Gratitude

25 Wednesday Nov 2015

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Jewish Identity, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Poetry, Quote of the Day, Uncategorized

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Tennessee Williams put it exactly right: “You know we live in light and shadow. That’s what we live in – a world of light and shadow; and it’s confusing.” (Orpheus Descending)

No life is simple, but along comes Thanksgiving and tradition compels us to emphasize gratitude regardless of our circumstances, how we may feel and conditions in the world.

For some, gratitude comes easily. For others gratefulness is challenging. Nurturing gratitude, however, is one of our most effective means to dispel the “shadow” and lift us towards the “light.”

Here are a number of reflections from Jewish tradition and world literature that offer us perspective, insight, wisdom, and hope.

“Hodu l’Adonai ki tov, ki l’olam chasdo – Give thanks to God, for Adonai is good…God’s steadfast love is eternal.” –  Psalm 136 (9th century, B.C.E.)

“When you arise in the morning give thanks for the morning light, for your life and strength. Give thanks for your food and the joy of living. If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies in yourself.” – Native American Prayer, Tecumseh Tribe

“How strange we are in the world, and how presumptuous our doings! Only one response can maintain us: gratefulness for witnessing the wonder, for the gift of our unearned right to serve, to adore, and to fulfill. It is gratefulness which makes the soul great.” – Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972)

“Ingratitude to a human being is ingratitude to God.” – Rabbi Samuel Hanagid (993-1056 CE)

“What have you done for me lately is the ingrate’s question.” – Rabbi Joseph Telushkin

“If you cannot be grateful for what you have received, then be thankful for what you have been spared.” – Yiddish proverb

“Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.” – William Arthur Ward, American scholar, author, pastor and teacher (1921-1997)

“Gratitude, not understanding, is the secret to joy and equanimity.” – Anne Lamott, writer (b. 1954)

“Thank everyone who calls out your faults, your anger, your impatience, your egotism; do this consciously, voluntarily.” – Jean Toomer, poet and novelist (1894-1967)

“We should write an elegy for every day that has slipped through our lives unnoticed and unappreciated. Better still, we should write a song of thanksgiving for all the days that remain.” – Sarah Ban Breathnach, author (b 1948)

“Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all others.” – Cicero, Roman philosopher (106 BC – 43 BC)

“If the only prayer you say in your life is ‘Thank you,’ that would suffice.” – Meister Eckhart, German theologian, philosopher (1260-1328)

“When I started counting my blessings my whole life turned around.” – Willie Nelson

“The highest tribute to the dead is not grief, but gratitude.” – Thorton Wilder

“I can no other answer make but thanks, and thanks, and thanks, and ever thanks.” – William Shakespeare (1564-1616)

Terezin – a poem by Hanus Hachenburg z’l

15 Wednesday Apr 2015

Posted by in Holidays, Jewish History, Jewish Identity, Poetry, Stories

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Tonight and tomorrow is Yom Hashoah, Holocaust Memorial Day.

This past October, I was with a group from my synagogue that visited Terezin. We were led by a survivor of Terezin, Auschwitz and a death march back to Terezin, Pavel Stansky – now 93 years old. Pavel was a teacher then, and devoted his time with the children to try and bring them some happiness in those dark days, weeks and months.

A total of 15,000 children under the age of 15 passed through Terezin. Of these, about 100 came back.

This poem was written in 1943 by Hanus Hachenburg, z’l.

“That bit of filth in dirty walls,
And all around barbed wire,
And 30,000 souls who sleep
Who once will wake
And once will see
Their own blood spilled.

I was once a little child,
Three years ago.
That child who longed for other worlds.
But now I am no more a child
For I have learned to hate.
I am a grown-up person now,
I have known fear.

Bloody words and a dead day then,
That’s something different than bogie men!

But anyway, I still believe I only sleep today,
That I’ll wake up, a child again, and start to laugh and play.
I’ll go back to childhood sweet like a briar rose,
Like a bell which wakes us from a dream,
Like a mother with an ailing child
Loves him with woman’s love.
How tragic, then, is youth which lives
With enemies, with gallows ropes,
How tragic, then, for children on your lap
To say: this for the good, that for the bad.

Somewhere, far away out there, childhood sweetly sleeps,
Along that path among the trees,
There o’er that house
Which was once my pride and joy.
There my mother gave me birth into this world
So I could weep . . .

In the flame of candles by my bed, I sleep
And once perhaps I’ll understand
That I was such a little thing,
As little as this song.

These 30,000 souls who sleep
Among the trees will wake,
Open an eye
And because they see
A lot

They’ll fall asleep again. . .”

Notes: This poem is preserved in a typewritten copy. In the right corner, “IX. 1944” is written in and on the right side, the following is written in pencil: “Written by children from the ages of 10 to 16, living in homes L 318 and L 4176.” The poem is unsigned, but the author was identified by O. Klein, a former teacher at Terezin, as Hanus Hachenberg. He was born in Prague on July 12, 1929, and deported to Terezin on October 24, 1942. He died on December 18, 1943 at the age of 14 in Oswiecim (i.e. Auschwitz). The copy is likely from a later date.

The above notes and the poem are taken from “I never saw another butterfly… Children’s Drawings and Poems from Terezin Concentration Camp 1942-1944.” McGraw-Hill. New York. Printed in Czechoslovakia (now the Czech Republic). 1971. Pages 22-23 and 78.