Each of these poems is a beautiful reflection on the tension between Exile and hope for a permanent and safe harbor that is so much a part of the story of the Jewish people. These poems span two centuries of Jewish literary accomplishments in the United States of America.
A Jewish Portuguese immigrant woman was commissioned to write the inscription for the Statue of Liberty. That inscription has within it one of the most famous lines in American literature: Give me your tired, your poor/Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.
"The New Colossus" is inscribed on the Statue of Liberty. Emma Lazarus was born in New York City, the descendant of Portuguese Jews who emigrated in the sixteenth century. Lazarus spoke out strongly for the rights of all immigrants.
THE NEW COLOSSUS
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name--
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
Cries she with silent lips:
"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
(inscribed on the Statue of Liberty)
by Emma Lazarus 1849-1887
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Adrienne Rich lived in Santa Cruz, California in 1998. This extraordinary poet and activist, winner of the biggest poetry award in America, listened to people more than she talked. She read this, among other poems, in the little church in Santa Cruz, where she was the featured reader.
PROSPECTIVE IMMIGRANTS PLEASE NOTE
Either you will
go through this door
or you will not.
If you go through
there is always the risk
of remembering your name.
Things look at you doubly
and you must look back
and let them happen.
If you do not go through
it is possible to live worthily
To maintain your attitudes
to hold your position
to die bravely
But much will blind you,
much will evade you,
at what cost, who knows?
The door itself
makes no promises.
It is only a door.
Adrienne Riche
Karl Shapiro was the first Jewish recipient of the Pulitzer prize for poetry, in1945. The poem below speaks poignantly of the disconnection he feels between his immigrant grandmother and himself.
MY GRANDMOTHER
My grandmother moves to mind in context of sorrow
And, as if apprehensive of death, in black;
Whether erect in chair, her dry and corded throat harangued by grief,
Or at ragged book bent in Hebrew prayer, Or gentle, submissive, and in tears to strangers;
Whether in sunny parlor or back of drawn blinds.
Though time and tongue make love disparate,
On daguerreotype with classic perspective
Beauty I sigh and soften at is hers.
I pity her life of deaths, the agony of her own,
But most that history moved her through
Stranger lands and many houses,
Taking her exile for granted, confusing
The tongues and tasks of her children's children.
Karl Shapiro 1913, Baltimore, MD
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THE HEBREW OF YOUR POETS, ZION
The Hebrew of your poets, Zion,
is like oil upon a burn,
cool as oil;
after work,
the smell in the street at night
of the hedge in flower.
Like Solomon,
I have married and married the speech of strangers;
none are like you, Shulamite.
Charles Reznikoff 1894-
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LET OTHER PEOPLE COME AS STREAMS
Let other people come as streams
that overflow a valley
and leave dead bodies, uprooted trees and fields of sand;
We Jews are as the grass,
trodden under foot today
and here tomorrow morning.
Charles Reznikoff
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I WILL WRITE SONGS AGAINST YOU
I will write songs against you,
enemies of my people; I will pelt you
with the winged seeds of the dandelion
I will marshal against you
the fireflies of the dusk.
Charles Reznikoff
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THE 151st PSALM
Are You looking for us? We are here.
Have You been gathering flowers, Elohim?
We are Your flowers; we have always been.
When will You leave us alone?
We are in America.
We have been here three hundred years.
And what new altar will You deck us with?
Whom are You following, Pillar of Fire?
What barn do You seek shelter in?
At whose gate do You whimper
In this great Palestine?
Whose wages do You take in this New World?
But Israel shall take what it shall take
Making us ready for Your hungry Hand!
Immigrant God, You follow me;
You go with me; You are a distant tree;
You are the beast that lows in my heart??™s gates;
You are the dog that follows at my heel;
You are the table on which I lean;
You are the plate from which I eat.
Shepherd of the flocks of praise,
Youth of all youth, ancient of days,
Follow us.
Karl Shapiro
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TO BE A JEW IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
To be a Jew in the twentieth century
Is to be offered a gift. If you refuse,
Wishing to be invisible, you choose
Death of the spirit, the stone insanity.
Accepting, take full life, full agonies:
Your evening deep in the labyrinthine blood
Of those who resist, fail and resist; and God
Reduced to a hostage among hostages.
Muriel Rukeyser (1913 -)
Leah Abramovitz - Laura Bernell, Professional Writer since 1984; Community College Adjunct English Instructor since 1982.
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