{"id":30043,"date":"2023-10-17T10:58:07","date_gmt":"2023-10-17T14:58:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lilith.org\/?p=30043"},"modified":"2023-10-19T11:36:32","modified_gmt":"2023-10-19T15:36:32","slug":"the-horror-of-these-times-a-reading-list","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lilith.org\/2023\/10\/the-horror-of-these-times-a-reading-list\/","title":{"rendered":"The Horror of These Times: A Reading List"},"content":{"rendered":"
The below newsletter went out to Lilith’s followers on Friday, October 13. Sign up for emails and follow Lilith on instagram and Facebook for more.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n The terror and horror of this period of war and violence are unprecedented. At Lilith, every conversation begins with the question \u201cHow are you, and how are your loved ones?\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n In Frankly Feminist: Short Stories from Jewish Women<\/em>, the editors note war\u2019s gendered impact on women: \u201cThe ways war transforms and can deform lives through multiple generations demonstrates again how the political is always, in the end, personal.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n With pain in our hearts for losses past and, we fear, losses yet to come, Lilith will in coming weeks and months continue to publish the stories of Jewish feminists about terror, loss, displacement, and connection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While right now any kind of peace feels elusive, we pray that the death and destruction cease. May the dread in our hearts lift and be replaced by the hope that there will be, speedily and in our day, good government, lasting peace and safety for all. <\/p>\n\n\n\n But as we find ourselves in the desolate space of prayers yet unanswered, we turn to some words from Lilith\u2019s archive as we seek some small measure of comfort this Shabbat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n With care, Offerings from Lilith’s Poetry Editor, Alicia Ostriker<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Poem (I lived in the first century of world wars) I lived in the first century of world wars. I lived in the first century of these wars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n from the volcano sequence the shekhinah as amnesiac<\/p>\n\n\n\n I was set up from everlasting, Then humanity named you wisdom you were above rubies come on, surely by now you remember who you are we will have to struggle so hard to birth you
The Lilith Staff<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n
<\/strong>by Muriel Rukeyser<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Most mornings I would be more or less insane,
The newspapers would arrive with their careless stories,
The news would pour out of various devices
Interrupted by attempts to sell products to the unseen.
I would call my friends on other devices;
They would be more or less mad for similar reasons.
Slowly I would get to pen and paper,
Make my poems for others unseen and unborn.
In the day I would be reminded of those men and women,
Brave, setting up signals across vast distances,
Considering a nameless way of living, of almost unimagined values.
As the lights darkened, as the lights of night brightened,
We would try to imagine them, try to find each other,
To construct peace, to make love, to reconcile
Waking with sleeping, ourselves with each other,
Ourselves with ourselves. We would try by any means
To reach the limits of ourselves, to reach beyond ourselves,
To let go the means, to wake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n
<\/strong>by Alicia Ostriker<\/p>\n\n\n\n
from the beginning before the earth was. . . .
When he prepared the heavens I was there. . .
rejoicing always before him. \u2014>Proverbs 8:23\u201330 <\/p>\n\n\n\n
monarchs ruled according to your counsel
you prepared a table from which we ate<\/p>\n\n\n\n
and exalted like the palm tree
or like the rose bushes in Jericho <\/p>\n\n\n\n
you\u2019re my mother my sisters my daughter
you\u2019re me <\/p>\n\n\n\n
this time
the brain like a cervix \u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n