Singing inside me with the best parts of you

[sovay]

My poem "די ירושה" is now online at Uncanny Magazine. It was written in September for Erev Rosh Hashanah. The title in Yiddish means "The Inheritance." The stories are all my family's; they have to be.

I think about marked and unmarked categories a lot these days. I always have—there's no way not to—but this administration keeps cranking up the contrast, applauding when lines are drawn ever more thickly and more and more cartoonishly. You may have seen the Washington Post's trash fire of an interfaith dating op-ed making the rounds on social media yesterday; I said on Facebook that my official position was "Mischling married to son of a preacher man calls shenanigans." I deeply appreciate the Forward's response: "Manners are very important to me, which is why I'm writing a piece blaming my ex-boyfriends' religion for our breakup in a national newspaper. This is a polite thing to do."

Thanks to the efforts of the National Center for Jewish Film, Michał Waszyński's The Dybbuk (דער דיבוק‎, 1937) is playing at the MFA in May. I have not seen that movie since college: there is a very good chance it was my first Yiddish film. The date has family significance. I will be there. I may even attend the accompanying documentary about Waszyński, although I wish it weren't screening first. You should always see the ghost for itself before it becomes a metaphor.

Comments

[asakiyume]

Now I get the talk on twitter all of yesterday. Oh. My. God. Becky. Look at the size of her butt antisemitism. The Forward response was excellent--thanks for linking to that.

[gwynnega]

Congratulations on the poetry publication!

"Manners are very important to me, which is why I'm writing a piece blaming my ex-boyfriends' religion for our breakup in a national newspaper. This is a polite thing to do."

Yes, exactly...

[selkie]

I want so much to be able to disseminate the letter my boss wrote SETTING THE WASHINGTON POST ON FIRE FOR BEING A WASTE OF INK AND SPACE. :(

[negothick]

"But, living in New York and working in theater, I frequently meet Jewish men." Well, it makes a change from the usual "I meet nothing but gay men." Unless she is buying into the stereotype that all gay men are actually Jewish. . .

[dhampyresa]

Congrats on the publication!

[batdina]

I, unfortunately, wandered over and read the WP piece. I'm suddenly very grateful I rarely read the WP because I refuse to pay for it. This is the kind of bs that makes any desire any small desire to purchase go away entirely.

[brigdh]

Congratulations on the poem!

And wow, I'd missed that Washington Post editorial. The Forward's satire makes up for it a little, but not nearly enough to excuse its existence.

[skygiants]

Oh dang, I am 100% going to go see the Dybbuk!!!

[kore]

You may have seen the Washington Post's trash fire of an interfaith dating op-ed making the rounds on social media yesterday

What really got me were the stats she quoted on interfaith marriages which DISPROVED HER OWN STUPID BIGOTED POINT, INASMUCH AS SHE HAD ONE.


(Also, honey, if your boyfriend's family is not inviting you to the seder, that's not because they're Jewish, that's because they probably don't want to hear a lot of sighing about how you have to go to church by yourself. God she sounded so passive-aggressive as well as bigoted.)

[thistleingrey]

So many feelings. Thank you.

[nineweaving]

(ME! I AM BLONDE!)

Says it all. Jesus H. Goyische Christ, what a jerk!

Nine

[jesse_the_k]

The poem is lovely. I don't quite understand it, but it still speaks to me.

Thanks for the link from Mara Wilson. Metafilter pointed me at Joe Bernstein's picture insouciantly blowing a shofar, captioned '"A Jewish Man's Rebellion" is my misunderstood LP of jazz standards played on shofar'