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 Beggars at the Wall Format: Paperback, 92
pp. "Mingling, profoundly,
the realities of individual and family histories, each poem a part of
a long, intense, complex prayer that rises to a Holiness greater than
fear or struggle, or destruction--Beggars at the Wall is a book
to remember, an astonishing achievement of witness and reconciliation."
In Beggars at the Wall, Rochelle Ratner guides us through an Israel that is not quite the Middle Eastern country we've learned about from CNN or travel books. This is her Israel: a fabled and disquieting place she wants to love like a homeland but cannot entirely embrace. In these plain-spoken poems, so naked in their concerns and passions, Ratner has given us the work of a secular Jew who yearns to be centered in Zion but who knows that Israel can never be her home. Her poems are washed in the light of Safed, Masada, and Jerusalem—a light that reveals hard truths about the lone Jewish nation on the planet… and about ourselves. —Charles Fishman Ratner turns a guided tour of Israel accompanied by family into a poetic diary of ambivalence, yet manages to temper her reservations with respect and love… On this arid trek through the usual tourist spots, Ratner chronicles her friction with her aging parents on politics and spirituality, as well as their discomfort with her beliefs: "You're not an Arab, are you?" Many characters appear in these poems, whiich occasionally ramble as they attempt to get the details right, but the total effect is one of honesty and pathos. Recommended. —Library Journal Although the urgency of this book increased while the current situation with Israel and her neighbors spiraled into war, Beggars at the Wall is not a book for a particular historical moment. It is a book by an accomplished poet that engages intensely with what it means to be a Jew in the United States and what it means to be an American Jew visiting Israel. Through that intense engagement, Ratner’s poems emerge transcendent and sublime. —Julie R. Enszer, Galatea Resurrects
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