{"id":2300,"date":"2012-04-26T15:41:00","date_gmt":"2012-04-26T15:41:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cjhblog.cjh.org\/index.php\/2012\/04\/26\/woman-with-shells-la-mer-the-sea-and-la-mere\/"},"modified":"2018-06-27T16:50:45","modified_gmt":"2018-06-27T16:50:45","slug":"woman-with-shells-la-mer-the-sea-and-la-mere","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/2012\/04\/26\/woman-with-shells-la-mer-the-sea-and-la-mere\/","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"<div id='gallery-1' class='gallery galleryid-2300 gallery-columns-3 gallery-size-thumbnail'><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon portrait'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/2012\/04\/26\/woman-with-shells-la-mer-the-sea-and-la-mere\/attachment\/2301\/'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/tumblr_m33fkjd47d1r3qmd1o1_r1_500-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n<p><em><a href=\"http:\/\/museums.cjh.org\/Display.php?irn=14193\" target=\"_blank\">Woman with Shells &#8211; La Mer (The Sea) and La Mere (The Mother).<\/a><\/em> Ruth Davidson Abrams. Oil on canvas. 1956. Yeshiva University Museum.<\/p>\n<p><strong>I Am Woman<\/strong><br \/>by Malka Heifetz Tussman<br \/>translated from the Yiddish by Marcia Falk\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>I am the exalted Rachel<br \/>whose love lit the way for Rabbi Akiba.<\/p>\n<p>I am the small, bashful village girl<br \/>who grew up among the tall poplars<br \/>and blushed at the &ldquo;Good morning&rdquo; of her brother&rsquo;s tutor.<\/p>\n<p>I am the pious girl<br \/>who paled as her mother raised her hands to her eyes<br \/>for the blessing over the Sabbath candles.<\/p>\n<p>I am the obedient bride<br \/>who humbly bent her head beneath the shears<br \/>the night before the wedding.<\/p>\n<p>I am the rabbi&rsquo;s daughter<br \/>who offered her chaste body to save a Jewish town<br \/>and afterwards set fire to herself.<\/p>\n<p>I am the woman of valor\u00a0<br \/>who bored and fed children<br \/>for a promised bit of paradise.<\/p>\n<p>I am the mother<br \/>who, in great hardship,<br \/>raised sons to be righteous men.<\/p>\n<p>I am the Hassid&rsquo;s daughter<br \/>infused with her father&rsquo;s fervor,<br \/>who went out defiant, with her hair cropped,<br \/>to educate the people.<\/p>\n<p>I am the barrier-breaker<br \/>who freed love from the wedding canopy.<\/p>\n<p>I am the pampered girl<br \/>who set herself behind a plow<br \/>to force the gray desert into green life.<\/p>\n<p>I am the one whose fingers<br \/>tightened around the hoe,<br \/>on guard for the steps of the enemy.<\/p>\n<p>I am the one who stubbornly\u00a0<br \/>carries around a strange alphabet<br \/>to impart to children&rsquo;s ears.<\/p>\n<p>I am all these and many more.<br \/>And everywhere, always, I am woman.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/jwa.org\/encyclopedia\/article\/tussman-malka-heifetz\" target=\"_blank\">Click here<\/a> to read more about\u00a0Malka Heifetz Tussman, and <a href=\"http:\/\/jwa.org\/encyclopedia\/article\/yiddish-literature-in-united-states\" target=\"_blank\">click here<\/a> to read more about Yiddish literature in the United States.<\/p>\n<p><em>Submitted by Sarah Ponichtera, Center for Jewish History.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Woman with Shells &#8211; La Mer (The Sea) and La Mere (The Mother). Ruth Davidson Abrams. Oil on canvas. 1956. Yeshiva University Museum. I Am Womanby Malka Heifetz Tussmantranslated from the Yiddish by Marcia Falk\u00a0 I am the exalted Rachelwhose love lit the way for Rabbi Akiba. I am the small, bashful village girlwho grew up among the tall poplarsand blushed at the &ldquo;Good&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"gallery","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1195,1196,962],"class_list":["post-2300","post","type-post","status-publish","format-gallery","hentry","category-blog-post","tag-malka-heifetz-tussman","tag-marcia-falk","tag-national-poetry-month","post_format-post-format-gallery"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2300","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2300"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2300\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2302,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2300\/revisions\/2302"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2300"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2300"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2300"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}