101 Jewish Poems for the 3rd Millennium, created by Nancy Naomi Carlson and Matthew E. Silverman, is a poetry anthology collection. This anthology includes pieces from authors like Ellen Bass, Matthew Lippman, Ed Hirsch, Jane Hirshfield, Ilya Kaminsky, Leah Browning, and many more. As well as notable poems such as "I Dream I understand My Great-Grandmother's Yiddish," by Michele Bombardier, "Shoes: Holocaust Museum, Washington D.C." by Jane Yolen, and "Shiva," by Melanie H. D. Sirof.
Nancy Naomi Carlson is a poet, translator, essayist, and editor, and has authored 10 titles (6 translated). An Infusion of Violets, her second full-length poetry collection, was published by Seagull Books (2019), and named a "New & Noteworthy" title by the New York Times Book Review. A recipient of grants from the NEA, Maryland Council for the Arts, and Arts & Humanities Council of Montgomery County, her work has appeared in such journals as APR, The Georgia Review, The Paris Review, and Poetry. She recently was decorated by the French government with the French Academic Palms.
"The poems in this finely curated anthology bear witness to the depth and breadth of Jewish tradition and culture. Somehow, these poems are able to comprehend horror and happiness, war and celebration, ritual and irreverence, awe and humor—all in the service of living life to the fullest despite a long and ongoing history of oppression. The light of the Jewish tradition shines brilliantly from these pages; we need that light now, and always." — Luke Hankins, Editor of Orison Books
"Through artful words and deep emotion, the contributors to 101 Jewish Poems accomplish something extraordinary. The highest, lowest, and most seemingly trivial of experiences are herein revealed as bursting, ready to be explored to new depths. These poems haunt with loss experienced and loss anticipated, a uniquely Jewish posture that somehow soothes by not shielding the reader from dark truths. You will meet on these pages artists whose dreams defy the limits of time and space, seers who dare to drag ancient texts and recent ancestors into the crucibles of the present and offer the whole mess up in an unfiltered, unvarnished balagan. Here, there is light to be discovered, and challenges to be met. 101 Jewish Poems is a well-crafted, precious glimpse into the raw, complicated, glorious heart of today's Jew. What a gift!" — Rabbi Menachem Creditor, Author of And Yet We Love: Poems, Scholar-in-Residence, UJA Federation of NY
