By Eileen Wingard
LA JOLLA, California –The next Jewish Poets–Jewish Voices session will feature student poets on Tuesday evening, March 11 at 7:00 p.m. in the Astor Judaica Library of the Lawrence Family JCC. This free evening program will include four students from the San Diego Jewish Academy, Sigal Kahn, Rachel Rosenfeld, Casey Kroll and Lily Greenberg Call, and several sixth grade students from the Soille Hebrew Day School. Three teachers from the Jewish Academy will also read their works during the open microphone half hour following the featured poets portion of the evening.
During the Jewish Poets—Jewish Voices series, which is now in its sixth year, student poets were showcased in 2010 and in 2012. These student evenings are very special and often reveal unusual talent.
This year, for the first time, the series has been expanded to four evenings. The first evening, last January, was devoted entirely to the poetry of the great Jewish writer, Hayyim Nahman Bialik.
Last month, the program featured two sisters, Thea Iberall and Penni Rubin, aunt and mother of JCC Senior Director, Melanie Rubin, and Rae Rose.
One of the delightful poems of Penni Rubin, an educator specializing in pre-school and elementary education, was the following:
All By Myself by Penni Rubin
I painted a picture the other day
with big lines & splashy blue swirls
I showed my Mom and she said
“Oh my, it’s a picture of a pretty girl.”
Well I thought I painted a rocket ship,
shooting to the moon as it should
But my Mom said it was a pretty girl,
I guess I’m not too good!
I glued the silliest puppet clown face
and showed it to my Dad.
He said the eyes were crooked & it was missing his mouth,
I guess he thought it was bad.
I made the biggest elephant out of clay
and showed my older brother
He yelled “Get that glob out of my room,”
I won’t make him another.
I drew a picture of me feeling sad,
my sister giggled and laughed all day
She said “Look at the ugly monster you made,”
that’s what I heard her say.
But I showed my teacher all of my work
she said “My what a talent you’ve got,
I see the big lines and the splashy blue swirls;
you must have thought about this a lot”
“I see rick rack and long curly red yarn
and fabric and clay from the shelf.”
She described what I did and it felt so good
I said proudly
“I made ‘em all by myself.”
Rae Rose read from her published book, Bipolar Disorder for Beginners. Here is a sample of her poetry:
Excerpt from Bake Challah in Heels
Out my window—a woman without a home
Sleeps under a bridge. I punched whoever built this city,
Invented these laws. How do holy women do it?
Pretty heads bowed over ovens, aprons dusted with sugar,
A sweet smile on every rosy face.
My kitchen? Hiroshima made of flour.
Egg shells litter counters as if I am a red-tailed hawk
Stealing from nests, cracking eggs with beak—
Can you create something holy if you are angry?
When God (supposedly) made the world, was He furious?
Is that why He made everything in the dark,
Was he too scared to look?
I use my fingertips,
Glaze Challah with egg whites.
It shimmers like moonlight hugging curves.
The heat will harden her, thicken her skin.
She will be able to take it. Take anything.
Pull down the moon—my moon—
I am reinventing woman. My own recipe – no rib required.
I have created something holy in a world
in which everything was already invented for me. Poorly.
This time I will change.
I look at the woman under the bridge.
Maybe this time, we’ll change everything.
Thea Iberall is an accomplished poet, playwright, and novelist. She has just completed her first novel The Swallow and the Nightingale about a 4,000 year-old secret brought through time by the birds. Her contextual poetry book The Sanctuary of Artemis weaves the knowledge of science and history with the stunning language of poetry. She teaches writing privately in Orange County and does performance poetry.
Time Magazine described Iberall’s journey into National Slam Poetry. By integrating knowledge with language, emotional stories with insights, she mesmerizes audiences. She has performed all around the country and has written a play enititled, We Did It For You which tells the story of how women got their rights in America, told by the women who were there. This play has been performed all over California and Iberall does workshops for colleges and organizations helping them learn the history in a fun afternoon!
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Eileen Wingard is a freelance writer specializing in the arts. She may be contacted via eileen.wingard@sdjewishworld.com
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