This piece is one of an ongoing series that we will be sharing in the coming days from Israeli authors and authors in Israel.
It is critical to understand history not just through the books that will be written later, but also through the first-hand testimonies and real-time accounting of events as they occur. At Jewish Book Council, we understand the value of these written testimonials and of sharing these individual experiences. It’s more important now than ever to give space to these voices and narratives.
Someone died tonight
someone who has a mother
and who was born perfect like a kiss
Someone who washed her beautiful face
plain like our face in the mirror
died among us at the edge of the night
She squeezed her way easily into the dress of night
and danced all night a star in her hair
and when the night was over she died without reason
Someone who donned socks early in the morning
his head bent for a moment close to the heart of the ground
who then got up to go work in his cotton socks
A girl
died at the end of the night how can it be
that the night did not die with her
The views and opinions expressed above are those of the author, based on their observations and experiences.
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Anat Levin is a poet, editor and teacher of creative writing. A graduate of the Pardes Fellowship of the National Library of Israel in Jerusalem, 2018 she is a recipient of the Prime Minister’s Prize for Hebrew Writers, 2019. Levin has published three poetry books and one novel. Her poems have been translated into several languages and published in anthologies and journals in Israel and around the world.
Shoshana Olidort is a critic, writer, and translator. She holds a PhD in comparative literature from Stanford University and is the web editor for the Poetry Foundation. Shoshana’s work, including essays, book reviews, translations, interviews, and poems, has appeared in Asymptote, the Columbia Journal, Electric Literature, LitHub, the Paris Review Daily, Public Books, and the Times Literary Supplement, among other outlets.
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