If Passover is the defining Jewish holiday, then Yehuda Amichai is Israel’s defining poet. Host Marcela Sulak reads some of his interpretations of the foundational Passover narrative, as we listen to music set to his words.

In his poem “Jewish Travel,” Amichai imagines Moses standing on Mount Nebo, staring into the Promised Land – a land he would never enter:

“He yearned for the land of Canaan he would never see,
but he turned east, toward the desert of those forty years,
and wrote the Torah as a travel book,
a memoir, every chapter with something very personal
that was his alone…”

Text:
Open Closed Open, by Yehuda Amichai. Translated by Chana Bloch and Chana Kronfeld. Harcourt, Inc., 2000.

Music:
Yoni Rechter and Rona Kenan – The Place In Which We’re Right
Ofra Haza – By The Well Of My Birthplace
Suzy Miller – God Pities Kindergarden Children

Producer: Laragh Widdess
Technical producer: Alex Benish