Alana Ruben Free and Akilah Mosley, Co-editors “Stretch Marks” – “Stretch Marks” is collection of poetry by a group of English language writers who have, temporarily or permanently, made their home in Israel. Whether born speaking…
Browsing: Ruben Free and Mosley – Stretch Marks
Poems on the theme of “Stretch Marks” by writers in English living in Israel, curated by Alana Ruben Free and Akilah Mosley.
At the end of the world, you turn left, not a complete left, more like a 45°. Now, this is not something you want to get wrong, because if you take a wrong turn, you might just end up back…
Every night when you go to bed a lonely old man is sitting in the corner counting the stars. A widow is living her life as if it is on hold. A homeless child is playing with poverty and hunger.…
my sister and I got them just from growing our thighs and breasts marked as if by tiger claws first they were bright red then with years faded to silver moonlight someone said it was because we were fed too…
I want to share with you my story. But none of the sentences make it to the page. You see, I have fled from my mother tongue— abandoned my voice. I have fallen in love with a new vocabulary, words…
As for Hannah, she was speaking in her heart, only her lips were moving. So Eli thought she was drunk. — Samuel 1:13 In synagogue I pray, my body separated from the men, a glass screen between us: they still…
It was the absent one that kept her awake at night while the others slept peacefully, tucked up in their beds after another story, another sip of water, another kiss dropped on their little heads. Years later, it is the…
When El-Natan was born the room swelled like a balloon and filled Jerusalem, my wailing knocking on the walls, my open legs the valleys of the souk and he between them, the rope of our dual history unfurling him. At…
born not in a hospital not in a bedroom not a manger not ark and wicker not an alley not the backseat not a clinic not the White House born a Sabra— tender, tough in a porcelain bowl welcome home…
An exercise on Psalm 119 I am truly blameless. Or happy. Or neither one. Deep at night, I sit in the shadow of my own verses the furrows I tread with my mouth sheltering saplings that might never grow into…