The Stones of Lifta - Softcover

Kaminsky, Marc

Softcover

ISBN 10: 194801758X ISBN 13: 9781948017589

Publisher: Dos Madres Press, 2019

Synopsis

The poems of Marc Kaminsky's The Stones of Lifta address the heartbreak of a history torqued and twisted by fear and hatred, but this poet's heart remains unbroken, alive, responsive, and attuned to a painful dissonance. He consents, humbly and bravely, to abide with the suffering of both Israelis and Palestinians, to align himself with both his heritage and his empathy, so that the indissoluble contradictions of that conflict become, ultimately, nothing less than the paradox at the heart of being fully, vulnerably, honestly human. -Richard Hoffman

Sample:

HINANI

Unworthy as I am, when I saw

footage of my friend Menachem climbing beneath

the Jerusalem hills with an old man-

a displaced person-an Arab

who guided him into the ruins of his home

in Lifta, I felt something

become as clear and actual to me

as if for one pulse beat I heard

a voice speaking to my heart.

Call it the divine, it is the voice that calls

to us once or twice in a lifetime.

We recognize it immediately and answer, Here I am,

for we remember it from before

we were born, and remain ready all our lives to go

where it sends us. It spoke clearly

and distinctly as I sat with Menachem

in my Brooklyn office, watching

his unfinished film, it said to me, Go

to Lifta, accompany your friend to the emptied village

of Lifta, walk beside him as he treads carefully

around the boulder that blocks the winding path up to Lifta.

About this title

About the Author

Marc Kaminsky is a poet and retired psychotherapist. He is the author of eight previous books of poetry, including The Stones of Lifta (Dos Madres Press), The Road from Hiroshima (Simon & Schuster), and Daily Bread (University of Illinois Press). His poems, essays and fiction have appeared in many magazines and anthologies, including The Manhattan Review, The American Scholar, Natural Bridge, The Oxford Book of Aging, and Voices within the Ark: The Modern Jewish Poets. He has published six books on aging, reminiscence and late-life development, and the culture of Yiddishkeit.

Edition details

• Publisher: Dos Madres Press
• Publication date: 2019
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 194801758X
• ISBN 13: 9781948017589
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 94