So Many Things are Yours

The poet and Talmud scholar examines Jewish texts, sexuality, and human vulnerability in poems that brim with wonder, sadness, sensuality, and humor. Kosman’s second volume in English explores Jewish texts —Bible, Talmud, midrash — alongside bodies, physical desires, military experiences, even a refrigerator. Demons and fantasy enter these poems; so do politics, so does God. These are not religious poems in a conventionally liturgical, “inspirational” sense; yet they point to the big questions that religion asks: about love, hate, desire, violence, transgression, disappointment.