POEM: ‘Signs’
It has to do with seeing. Light.
Or dark. It has to do with
knowing. Speak and prophesy,
darken and move:
But what I see is not what I know.
What I hear is not what I believe.
And now the first light is dark,
the morning has not yet lifted the night sky.
Chirping. At first many. Then few.
A call from a deeper-throated bird
till the others rest, and start again together.
Like a chorus with various parts assigned.
I never heard it this way before.
Rumble of planes.
Bees now. Little sounds.
And flaming purple spikes light the garden.
From Linda Zisquit’s recently published new collection “Return From Elsewhere.”
Why I became the Forward’s editor-in-chief
You are surely a friend of the Forward if you’re reading this. And so it’s with excitement and awe — of all that the Forward is, was, and will be — that I introduce myself to you as the Forward’s newest editor-in-chief.
And what a time to step into the leadership of this storied Jewish institution! For 129 years, the Forward has shaped and told the American Jewish story. I’m stepping in at an intense time for Jews the world over. We urgently need the Forward’s courageous, unflinching journalism — not only as a source of reliable information, but to provide inspiration, healing and hope.
— Alyssa Katz, editor-in-chief
