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On this episode, host Marcela Sulak reads two poems by Israeli poet Almog Behar, called Take this poem and copy it and A Poem for the Jailhouse Prisoners in preparation for Passover. Bahar has published books of poetry, a collection of short stories and a novel. In 2005, he won the Haaretz Short Story Competition for his story; Ana Min Al-Yahoud (I am one of the Jews).

Here is an excerpt from Take this poem and copy it:

“Take this poem and copy it a thousand times and distribute it to people on the city’s main street. And say to them I wrote this poem this is a poem I wrote this is a poem I wrote this I wrote this poem I wrote this I wrote this I wrote. Take this poem and put it in an envelope and send it to your heart’s desire and include a short letter with it. And before you send it change its title and at the end add rhymes of your own. Sweeten the bitter and enrich the spare and bridge the cracked and simplify the clumsy and enliven the dead and square the truth. A person could take many poems and make them his.”

Almog Behar was born in Netanya, into a family of Arabic-speaking Jews, in 1978 and lives in Jerusalem. He studied philosophy at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Text:
Almog Behar, Take This Poem and Copy It. Various translators.

Music:
Naseer Shamma – Baghdad Night

Producer: Ariella Plachta
Technical producer: Tammy Goldenberg