I first met Mel in the early days of JFREJ, and had known her writing and her reputation for a long time. I was amazed and kind of in awe to find myself in a room with a baby in a snuggly doing a workshop with the leaders of this amazing new organization. I had known and worked with Leslie for quite a long time before that.

I don’t remember what year it was, but a really important next part of the story was a letter that Leslie had sent out, which she did now and then to many of her closest friends and relatives, saying that she had fallen in love with a poet. That was a great letter! I was so happy.

I loved Melanie’s amazing wit. I loved her searing intelligence. I loved her scholarship. I loved that I learned every time that I talked with her…and I loved how she loved Leslie. And how Leslie loved her, loves her.

Some years back I was at my desk and I got an email from Mel and she said, “Kath, I have to talk to you. Let’s get together and scheme about how we can help Leslie get a MacArthur.” (Can somebody hear me???) So far I wasn’t that helpful but I loved that she asked that. And we’ll still ask that!

The Colors of Jews is, I think, one of the most important books about what it is about, which is about everything in some fundamental sense. Some of us – very few in the old days – were speaking as Jews about certain things. So, I wanted to read this poem.

When people say that Melanie was and is brave, I was thinking as I was listening to these beautiful testimonials…She never swerved from something we call truth. We use the word truth, but Melanie always told the truth. And that is brave!

Palestine in April 2003

Palestine: in April 2003: A hotel in Baghdad that housed
journalists, bombarded by a US tank, killing three reporters.

Palestine: in April 2003: A town in Texas outside which an
oil tank mysteriously exploded.

Palestine: in April 2003: A town in West Virginia, home of
PFC Jessica Lynch, the rescued wounded soldier. Except she
wasn’t rescued, there were no guns, no guards, no danger;
the hospital put her in the cleanest room, with the best bed,
the one least likely to give bedsores, the Iraqi doctor
explained. Then they notified the US Army so soldiers
could come get her.

And finally: Palestine: in April 2003: A would-be nation,
nothing new, only the time of year when Jews are bound to
tell the story of our liberation and thus, like it or not, our
story is bound to the story of the people our people oppressed.
And when at the end of our seder we say Next Year in
Jerusalem hadn’t we better smash open our hearts to lodge
the frightened truth: that Jerusalem is also theirs; that peace
and home are also their birthright; that those who called it a
land without people or a people without land were simply
wrong.

Melanie Kaye/Kantrowitz, presente!!