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.

In col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Jew­ish Book Coun­cil, JBI is record­ing writ­ers’ first-hand accounts, as shared with and pub­lished by JBC, to increase the acces­si­bil­i­ty of these accounts for indi­vid­u­als who are blind, have low vision or are print disabled. 

It’s about time to talk about shadows, 

i.e. about the clouds and what they do

or don’t under the sun 

when sun­shine falls and leaves a shiv­er­ing line

upon the sea, and on that which is there, 

I mean sunlight 

not all the times

but at dawn

fac­ing these clouds

which are always there on hot days like these.

How they say to the light- dis­ap­pear or appear at once 

call dark­ness — darkness

day — day

and after a few long moments

turn­ing my being under the sun

too exposed – i.e. impossible 

and make me look down, turn around

to that streak of light in front of my eyes

lead me to that insight

that the longest shad­ow falls at sunrise.

The views and opin­ions expressed above are those of the author, based on their obser­va­tions and experiences.

Sup­port the work of Jew­ish Book Coun­cil and become a mem­ber today.