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This piece is a part of the Berru Poet­ry Series, which sup­ports Jew­ish poet­ry and poets on PB Dai­ly. JBC also awards the Berru Poet­ry Award in mem­o­ry of Ruth and Bernie Wein­flash as a part of the Nation­al Jew­ish Book Awards. Click here to see the 2021 win­ner of the prize. If you’re inter­est­ed in par­tic­i­pat­ing in the series, please check out the guide­lines here.

Marisa Han­dler — writer, singer-song­writer, teacher, and coach — is the author of the mem­oir Loy­al to the Sky, which won a Nau­tilus Gold Award for world-chang­ing books. Her essays, fic­tion, and poet­ry have appeared in numer­ous pub­li­ca­tions. Marisa earned her MFA from the Iowa Writ­ers’ Work­shop, and has received many fel­low­ships in Cre­ative Writ­ing, includ­ing a Ful­bright and an Eliz­a­beth George Foun­da­tion grant. She teach­es wide­ly on cre­ativ­i­ty, writ­ing, med­i­ta­tion, and trans­for­ma­tion at places like Esalen, Stan­ford, Spir­it Rock, and the Cal­i­for­nia Insti­tute for Inte­gral Stud­ies. More at www​.marisa​han​dler​.com.