Poetry || Submissions

Kathleen Carbone Chaffin reports that the latest issue of Melic is up at http://www.melicreview.com It's a highly recommended online poetry 'zine with a print edition coming out soon.

Five Poems by Yasmine al Tawdy, a Western woman in an Eastern country. She says she likes William Blake the best, but I have to admit that while that comes through the poetry, so does a rap beat and a quick heat of sensuality, smarts and a sadness with enough self-conciousness that shows she doesn't take herself too seriously.

By Janet Buck: A Boy, a Bottle, a Man

Poems by John Sweet

Bio Poems by Ward Kelley

Work Play Sleep by Yosh

Poems by Jay Seth Guberman

In Passing by Michael Eilan

Provocation -- A Computer Game

Tom Berman, on history, memory and little nasty bugs called barchash

Yehuda Amichai
From Karen Alkalay-Gut

THE MINISTER OF POETRY

To Yehuda Amichai

We were walking by the Labor Party Office
one night on Hayarkon Street.
The lights were on,
and you said, "They are choosing
the ministers for the new government.
I should go in and tell them
they need me as the Minister of Poetry."
We walked on instead
to read at the American Embassy

There was a large crowd there,
drinks and little sandwiches,
a contextualizing speech by some professor
with someone important mentioning
something about a shortlist
for the big prize

and then the evening was over.

But you remain, for me,
from that night on
always
the Minister of Poetry.

DIRGE

It looks something like a vague train station,
but very smooth and in a dream.
And they have met here for the first time -
my dear aunt Chasha who died this morning,
and my Minister of Poetry, Yehuda Amichai,
who too has now been freed. They are on their way
to the most special part of heaven,
the site reserved for colossal souls
that incorporate everyone into their lives
and love and love and never deny
the ardor of others.
But their conversation is quite plain, a little mundane.
Perhaps they are talking about the times they never met
at Sloan-Kettering, and how they were born in the same year,
in the same world that vanished into their memories
and how felicitous to make each other's acquaintance
now, as they are about to broaden the range of their embrace.

From Robert Rosenberg

Yehuda Amichai was indeed the Minister of Poetry. The first time I met him I did not immediately recognize him. It was at a small dinner party at the home of a a friend who lived in Abu Tor, not far from Yehuda's own home. My wife Silvia and I arrived a little late, and the conversation over drinks before the meal was about the Abu Tor neighborhood. For some reason, the discussion was focused on the makolet , the Ma and Pa grocery store in the neighborhood. And the man sitting across the living room from me spoke so knowledgeably, with what Silvia calls "a luxury of detail" as he spoke of the shop that I asked if he was the owner of the shop. This, after all, took place in Jerusalem, a city where it is possible to discover a great scholar working as a cobbler, a literary man behind the counter of a pickle shop. Anything is possible in that strange city.

There was a frozen silence as it sunk in that I had just insulted the greatest living poet in the land. Our host reprimanded me with a "don't you recognize Yehuda Amichai?" Which I immediately did, and apologized as profusely as possible, probably using far too many words in my embarassment. But Yehuda laughed, and not at me -- nor even the idea. For he said, that yes, perhaps that is what he was, a shopkeeper of the small details of life in place where too many people deal in the grand.

It was flattering to me that on the rare occasions over the years since, when we happened to meet that he remembered this, with a wry smile and a friendly manner. He is surely in heaven now, if such a place exists after life. In life, it surely does, in his poetry.

Here's a link to a search for Yehuda Amichai at Google

Previously

Two poems by Yosh an LA man with concerns about the I.

Rowena Silver is back at Ariga with a short poem called Feathers about a bird and a missing submarine

And Janet I. Buck is back with six poems about mourning. Chief of Grief

Our old pal Alan Kaufman, editor of Tattoo Jew, has published a much acclaimed "Outlaw Bible of Poetry." Check him out here, and Tattoo Jew out here, and the book is available through Amazon

An invitation to participate in the International Peace Poem Project.

Pointing to the driftwood and other poems by Kathy Egan

Poems by Richard Ballon

Poems by Anne Boulender

Five poems by Don Barbera

Four poems by Kathleen Sullivan Isacson

Bio Poetry by Ward Kelley: Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Migrating birds by Elisha Porat

Beth Laura O'Leary finds a blessing.

Five Poems by John Andrew Durler

Jackie Joice on the women of Afghanistan

John Marks writes on Deadsville.com

Editor/writer Thomas Fortenberry, on Jerusalem

A Ripening Love -- 10 short poems about fruits, vegetables, love and sex by Ben Landy

New poetry from Philip Hyams

New poems from Janet Buck

A new story from Elisha Porat

Words for a Photograph by Asher Reich (translated by Karen Alkalay-Gut)

Frances Mancuso Durler sends in five short poems about love and loss.

Elisha Porat's story, "Purification" is about an aging soldier - and a young man's own sense of fragility.

Three Poems for Elisha Porat by John Horvath Jr.

Grace Buller works as a security guard to put bread on the table, and observes people moving through life.

Helen Shella Mendoza is a 16 yr old student at Canossa Academy in the Philippines, who "wanted to share my ideas in a deeper and most appreciated way that no one in my place fathoms!"

Susan Fridkin returns to Ariga with poems about mothers, the Holocaust and Lot's wife...

Bess Kemp from Napa Valley sends in her poems

Richard Fein was one of our first contributors. Now he's back with five new poems

Tasha Jones Editor of Calliope, an online zine, sends in her poems

Mark Ratajczak is a poet and bassist.

Rowena Silver on the death of Hussein and the life of the women at the funeral.

Hagy Auerbach on the bus from Jerusalem

Elisha Porat sends in the same poem, translated three different ways. It's a little poetry workshop...

Writer and translator Jeff Green of Jerusalem, reveals two of his poems.

Longtime friend of Ariga, Alan Kaufman sends in a few poems from San Fransisco, including a much acclaimable "When I was a soldier"

Twenty-three-year-old Hagy Averbach sends in four poems that touch on music, love and loneliness.

From California, Victoria Giannecchini sends in a few poems about sex and grief

"Farewell Letter" a short poem by Elisha Porat, about Hebrew and inheritance.

Shimon Palmer is a new poet at Ariga

Janet I. Buck is back at Ariga with new poems about age, death and love.

Gregory Frugoli says he's a painter, screenwriter, singer and songwriter -- from LA. He writes tough stuff.

Payback is Elisha Porat's monthly short story at Ariga.

Elazar owns White Raven, a great bookstore on Rehov Yonah Hanavi (Jonah the Prophet St.) in Tel Aviv. His poems are both tres 1950s and very up to date.

Nathalie Stephens prose poems are seering and suggestive, sorrowful and sensual. Perhaps it is because she is French and Jewish and Canadian.

Radical Amazement (In memory of Abraham Heschel) by Alex Gavrilovich

Richard Bear is a Microfilm expert and fascinated by the history of typography, a poet able to evoke nature's most pristine moments and at the same time to refer to the classics ranging from Spenser to Pound. Here are three of his poems.

Three poems from David Reiter, an award-winning poet and short story author from Australia

The Bearded Man is Elisha Porat's story of the month. As usual, it's funny and sad and touching and strong.

Karen Alkalay-Gut was the first poet we published at Ariga and since then has sent in several wonderful poems. Her latest is called Liz Magnes plays Gershwin (while I scribble) and is as political as it is personal.

Ward Kelley likes to base poetry on other poets' biographies, creating unusually incise poems of literary interest. We've published a few of his poems in the past and now he's sent in these, including one about T.S. Elliot of particular interest.

Orit Perlman's a jewelry designer and mezzo soprano, a mother and poet. Here are five poems from her.

Elisha Porat's monthly story. A Hike in the Galilee -- a story of failed seduction and self-realization.

Philip Hyams is an English-language poet living in the Tel Aviv area. LET US NOT FORGET ON YITZHAK'S THIRD is his poem for the third anniversary of the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin.

Gary Gordon is a poet and teacher, and founding member of Building Bridges -- a Jewish, Muslim, Christian group dedicated to dialog. Here are two of his poems -- one about Isaac and Ishmael the other about Bibi

Elisha Porat's latest story at Ariga is, as usual, about a soldier's experience, this time both about Jewish thought and private love.

Renee Giusti says she's also known as aka madneenee, and offers this pretty ditty called "the Opposites in One" about being both this and that at the same time.

Lorena Lowell Castricone offers a few poems from Massachusetts, full of color and cascades.

Noreen McQuade O'Neill sends in a few poems. She is a freelance writer, Marketing and Communications Consultant now living in San Rafael, California. She recently spent 38 months living in Jakarta, Indonesia with her husband, Michael. She is the second of eight children, a mother, and, she says, a world traveler and visionary.

Four Poems from Richard Bear in Oregon, writing about land and love and family and children and strangers and friends and the day and the night.

In two poems, Moshe Benarroch writes first about a suicide bomber and then about Mahmoud Darwish

Scott Holstad is an oft-published American poet, whose most recent book was nominated for a Pulitzer in 1996

Alex Gavrilovich writes knowledgeably about war's embarrassments

Miriam Schneid-Ofseyer is a survivor with a deceptively innocent style writing about mothers.

Elisha Porat's stories of soliders are more about peace than about war. Here's Shell Shock

Ever tenacvious in her hatred of war and her love of poetry, Ada Aharoni sends in some poems for the New Year.

Alex Gavrilovich sends in a prose poem called Prayer

We don't usually put up pointers here to off-site webs but Patrick Martin's Poetry Page is an awesome collection of poetry resources on the net. Very much worth the visit.

Leslie Cohen: luminous

Women and Cigars By Karen Alkalay-Gut

Season's Greetings by Michael Eilan

Promises a short story by Elisha Porat

A Report from Michael Eilan on the situation in Galilee.

Kent Kelly is an artist working in Denver who sent in a poem called Ascension Day.

Elisha Porat is a kibbutznik writer who has won many awards for his stories and poetry. He writes beautifully about the simple soldier's experiences, as you can see from Night of the Scorpions.

Janet Buck is an occasional contributor of poems about sensuality and pain, sex and love, womanhood and mortality. Here are some new poems from her.

Karen Alkalay's Of Israel and the Language is about words as weapons

Vivian Eden sends in two poems from Jerusalem

Jack C. is an international traveler who recently visited Jerusalem's Western Wall.

Some poems by Slater Bakhtavar

Elizabeth Sterling Wall sends in a poem about the bombs in Africa.

Jay Guberman's poems are about being Jewish and also about being in love.

Fred Shahrabani sends in a few poems

Many little poems by A.R. Lamb

Contemplating on Aleph by ChairmanSteve

A medal with the wrong side up by Michael Holmboe Meyer

Jay Guberman's poems include some about Israel and some about love. We particularly liked the one called "Another"

From a Vermont mountaintop, several short, poems by Thea Childs, who combines anger and love and rage and passion into a voice both young and old.

From Michelle Collatina: In Italian, with an English translation by the poet, a poem about Passchendaele where mud slides earlier this year killed many in Italy.

knot by Hannah Sassaman is a very short, very sweet poem about women-girls.

Brian M. Rock is a 21-year-old American soldier serving in Macedonia. His poems about love, sex, and yes, mortality have the power of youth and a surprising self-awareness.

From a poet called Void, some poems about the past and the present.

Elisha Porat, farmer poet kibbutznik, sends in four poems And his very short story On the Road to Beirut is stunning.

Susan sends in three more poems, including one about the photographer Roman Vishniac, perhaps the most important of all the photographers of the eve of the Holocaust.

Sherman Pearl, a co-founder of the Los Angeles Poetry Festival, sends in two poems

Maryann Hazen sends in some poems evocative of past and present.

Five short poems about daily life from Charles Kormos

Rowena Silver's poem about Oslo is not about a city, but about an idea.

Three Poems by Ward Kelley, about Sylvia Plath, Edgar Allen Poe, and F. Scott Fitzgerald.

T-shirt decal for Independence Day: A Poem by by Karen Alkalay-Gut as part of the celebration of Israel's 50th anniversary. It reads more like an ideographic prayer than anything else...

Emily Henderson's poems are about womanhood and pain -- and joy.

Charles Kormos, veteran English-language poet in Israel, sends in five poems

It's been here a while, but just a reminder of what it was like in Gaza: The Flag by Immanuel Suttner

Michael McNeilly sends in a few poems from Zero City

Stephen Pain is an Anglo-American poet, raised in Singapore, studying in England.

New Poems from Philip Hyams, a Israeli/Canadian poet and novelist now living in Tel Aviv.

Poems by Moshe Benarroch is a Moroccan-born Israeli who speaks clearly of the Immigrant's Fate.

Rasika writes a poem about the hunger for Freedom

'BOOOP'/socio/politico/ecosystemic poems: Poems by ELAZAR aka New Yorker Larry Freifeld, who is a poet and owner of the White Raven Bookstore on Yonah Navi Street, just off Allenby in Tel Aviv. His shop includes classics, used books, collectors items, and various bits and pieces of memorabilia from by-gone ages. His poems are imbued in the prophetic tradition.

Susan Cunningham writes a surprising poem about "These Men." But it's not just about them...

Not really poetry, but nonetheless literary, here's a short essay by Mark Midbon on Stanley Kubrick's film 2001 with particular attention paid to the Biblical origins of the imagery. He calls it "2001: A Space God-esy"

A Daughter's Rose by Darlene

Plastic Flowers in Paradise by Philip Hyams goes to the heart of the conflict.

Janet I. Buck's poems are about the pain of love and its loss

Ann Rich's poems from her book "Empty Shells", are about finding the inner self.

Blessings and Vernal Sorrow from Susan

Harbor Words is an American poem in the grand tradition of New York's harbor -- from Colin Wolfe.

Also from Colin Wolfe is Skins, an inward look.

ricochet from Colin Wolfe

Fall, New England from Scrambling the Stones by Dorrit O'Leary

With Great Sorrow we Announce the Passing of Zyggy Frankel -- poet and raconteur extraordinaire, with a biography full enough for three poets

Rowena Silver is getting ready for the next holiday in "Diaspora Hanukka"

Michael Eilan goes back to Jerusalem in a short, painful poem he calls and a little bit of melodrama before the intermission...

From Allan Moon, Two Poems appropriate for winter

He wore cobra snake head boots By Ben Landy

Joan Godfrey sends in four new poems that reveal childhood -- and adulthood -- beneath a cool sky.

INBAL -- Karen Alkalay-Gut on Inbal Perlmutter's Death -- October 7 1997

Harold Janzen's Three Poems are carefully constructed slices of life's pains and pleasures -- September 1997

From Rowena Silver, September Morn A short message to outer space about the sad inner space of this world. September 1997

From Matt Hildebrand in Canada come three short poems evocative, compelling, surprising. September 1997

From Laura Fleury in Nova Scotia, Two Poems, including "Remembering Lloyd" a poem about family and AIDS August 1997

From Red Slider -- Four Poems that recall childhood, endorse adulthood, and praise love. August 1997

From Elizabeth Sterling Wall, A California scholar, Jerusalem Bombing A short poem more powerful than any bomb July 1997

On the Making of Deity By Michael Eilan -- advertising, land clearing and raising children -- July 1997

Florida tapestry By Colin Wolfe looks like a simple love poem. But there's more to it than that, if you look carefully. July 1997

Song of the Cedar By Doug Tanoury is a marvelous evocation of Lebanon. Don't miss it -- and you can follow the link at the end of the poem to Doug's own home page, where he has more poems, and links to other poets. June 1997

Whether she's read Ogden Nash or not, we don't know, but Angela Powell's rhyming poetry about her life are both light and truthful of the human condition. June 1997

Four Love Poems by Bob Monahan -- posted June 3 1997

Public Outcry
Why are you silent, poets of Israel?
How can you write of anything but
the war we are careening toward like
children on a water slide screaming
for the moment they will hit the sea?
-- by Karen Alkalay-Gut -- posted May 20 1997

Announcement: A new Israeli poetry site in English: http://techunix.technion.ac.il/~ada Edited by poet Ada Aharoni of the Conflict Studies department at the Technion in Haifa, this site carries translations of poets ranging from Amihai to Somek. Check it out! -- But don't forget to come back to Ariga.

Young poet Kyle MacLean sends in three short poems from Halifax, Nova Scotia

Poet and teacher Richard E. Sherwin offers a new version of Who Knows One? The Traditional Passover Song as well as a brief analysis of the traditional text.

Writer, teacher and mother, Susan Terris' poems of memories and persona are about the past but exist powerfully in the present.

To say her poems are about life and death would be to undermine the power of Ruth Daigon's poetry.

Four Poems by Eli Tomer

Cutting Through the Mountain A press release about Ariga contributor Immanuel Suttner's latest book

Work By Michael Eilan

On Being Deaf By Jim Yaghi

Two Poems by Max Berkovitz: Yortzeit and Postcard

Apropo Cafe by Rowena Silver

The Flag A story from the Israeli occupation of Gaza -- by Ariga Contributor Immanuel Suttner.

A New Version of Song of Songs

Passionate Poetry from Murli Menon, a poet and environmental activist from India.

The Wishmaker By Max Wolfson

A Sonnet from Rowena Silver Aspiration

Richard Fein: Five Poems

David Sutherland, editor at Recursive Angel sends in some new poetry.

Buying furniture on Herzl Street on the day Bibi comes back to Israel from his first enforced meeting with Arafat -- by Karen Alkalay-Gut

SHORT STORY! Sleeping with the Dead A short story by Barbara Kessel

ON THE LACK OF PRODUCTIVITY OF ISRAELI ARTISTS IN THESE HARD TIMES By Karen Alkalay-Gut

On the Beach One Summer Evening, a poem by Richard Grove, editor of SEEDS Magazine

SHORT STORY! The Beginning of the Trip Home "This story is one of several about Harry and Becky Rabinowitz. In this one, Harry goes to war and is caught in the Malmedy massacre. In spite of the violence, the point of the story is that decent men can transcend their history and find some sense of identity with each other." -- By Bert Benmeyer

For Shimon Peres By Karen Alkalay-Gut

Zygmunt Frankel's WRITING FROM ISRAEL includes poetry and prose. Combining profound cynicism with ironic humor, he has been described as "a cynic with a human face." He was born in Poland, grew up (deported) in Siberia, and lived in England, before settling in Israel in time to participate in the Sinai, Six-Day and Yom Kippur wars. (Be sure to use the back button to return to Ariga)

The End of Marriage by Lois Ungar

Brian Eno's list of 128 Oblique Strategies. Like Gleb Shadeck's International Pop Chart List, this list has a poetry all its own.

Five Poems from Richard Fein

A Jerusalem Poem from Immanuel Suttner

From a distant contributor: Summer's Child by Joan Godfrey

Terror March 1996 by Ed Codish.

Three poems about writing, love, and erotica from Recursive Angel Editor David Sutherland

From Karen Alkalay-Gut, a poem about the fine line between Jewish and Israeli. Flight

Two Poems emailed in from Deena Shunra

In reply to the question: When did your peace begin? By Ronni Somek

Three Poems by Asher Reich