Liberation

Liberation (Randyjw; January 27, 2019)

 

International Holocaust Remembrance Day

 

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Working Definition of AntiSemitism by International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance:

 

https://www.holocaustremembrance.com/working-definition-antisemitism?usergroup=7

 

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I Am poem – Anne Frank

by Natasha Hashemi and Claire Hawer

 

(https://youtu.be/2p-a_mCO_JA)

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From Where I Come (Rachelgv/Randyjw; February 22, 2017)

 

From where I come

is by my ancestry.

By Adam and Eve

through Terach and Abraham

 

And, yet, again, in

further meanderings

 

Ur-Kasdim, and into Haran

in captivity in exile

by the rivers of Babylon

Asarah B’Tevet

 

By the well of Dotan

to the right of Pharoah’s rod

at Rameses and Pitom

in fields of Padan-Aram

 

and maybe by Paran

the cities of Shushan

released with help from King Ahashveros (of Iran)

who would assist us in rebuilding the Temple

 

We commemorate in memory

that the woman he wed to wife

Hadassah, known as Esther,

the Jewish Queen that saved our lives

 

And this is known as Purim

it’s also part of the Jewish story

and Chanukah you’ll know

by our defiance of Roman glory

 

From Egypt, in Goshen

having first lived in Knaan

through Avram’s sons and Yosef the one

and led out again by Moshe

 

And that’s the story of Passover

when we were freed from our bonds

When G-d redeemed us and saved us

with ten plagues to our oppressors rained down

 

When he brought us to the mount

and to the wilderness of Zin

and gave the commandments of Torah

the Sukkot and the Mishkan

 

And that’s the backgrounds of the holidays

of Passover, Shavuot, Sukkot,

of simple days under desert stars

happy in Simchat Torah

 

And back again

to the Holy Land

promised to us

and delivered by hand

 

Through Inquest, Expulsion,

and auto-da-fe,

through Kristallnacht, Holocaust,

forests and Babi Yar

 

In Zion, and Jaffa, Carmel and Ashdod,

Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem

In Ashkelon, Aza, and Yericho

in Hevron, and Shiloh, in the fields of Machpelah

 

By Isaac, by Jacob,

and all of his breed

and Rachel and Leah

and Ruth and David

 

Because where I come from

is where I have been

and by all of  G-d’s miracles,

Here I Am