A New Song: Poems Inspired by the Weekly Torah Portion

Roberta Chester, the author of A New Song, has chosen a particular detail from each weekly Torah portion, and shares her perspective in expressive poetry. Her viewpoint creates a “new song,” entertaining a possibility in the biblical text that illuminates and animates the past with the sensibility of the present. Each of these poems is in essence a midrash, whose root meaning is “to search out, to seek, to inquire.”

Rabbi Chaim Richman, Director of Jerusalem Lights, commented that “Roberta Chester is a poet of great faith and profound vision, who hears Hashem’s voice. Her poems emanate from a heart that overflows with the joy — and the pain — of the eternal Jewish experience. Her poems are like signposts along the road to the promised Redemption; like the secret whisperings of our ancestors; like pre-birth intuitive wisdom; like the white spaces in the Torah that give us the opportunity to pause in wonderment, breathless and thankful that this is our turn to be alive, not hungry for bread or thirsty for water, but to hear the words of Hashem.”

Rabbi Yitzchak A. Breitowitz, Rav of Kehillat Ohr Somayach, comments that "by sharing her reactions to the biblical text in beautiful and evocative poetry, Roberta invites the reader to engage in their own voyage of discovery, to find the meaning of the Torah as it applies to their lives and experiences.”

Publisher:

Mazo Publishers

Pages:

152

Date Published:

2023