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Robbi Nester: Tradition
For Judy Kronenfeld
My parents had already drifted from tradition,
taught me next to nothing of the rules their parents
and their parents lived by—the complicated dietary
prohibitions, demanding cabinets to spare, two
refrigerators, two sets of silverware. They left behind
the laws enforcing separation, the holy from the secular,
forbidden from the blessed, our people from all others.
At synagogue their mothers and grandmothers
were herded behind the mechitza. They couldn’t see
or hear. Men kept them penned like goats, stifling
in the summer, cold in winter, far from the hearth,
fearing pious men would be drawn away from prayer
by a seductive nape, golden down above an uncovered wrist.
I was American, which meant the old prayers came to me
only through an open window, chanted in a tongue
I did not understand. Yet my father still believed
that educating women was a waste. While my mother
fed the flame of my obsessions with the kindling
of her mother’s whispered wishes. I too had something
to pass down. I learned to light the candles, studied
the old books, taught my son to recognize the one
day of the week, one week of the year when we
eat matzo instead of bread and sing of freedom
and redemption. I know that he will teach this
to his child, even without truly knowing what it means.
~~~~
~~
Robbi Nester is a poet, writer, and retired educator. She is the author of four books of poetry—a chapbook, Balance (White Violet, 2012), and three collections—A Likely Story (Moon Tide, 2014), Other-Wise (Kelsay, 2017), and Narrow Bridge (Main Street Rag, 2019).
Poem copyright 2025 Robbi Nester
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Beautiful poem. Brought up memories of away at college, trying something different to find myself, keeping kosher, Hillel, a child raised as agnostic trying on a beautiful old set of clothes that didn’t fit but felt comforting.
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Robbi: what a superb, mellifluous tonality you achieve in this lovely telling of culture and personal history. The poem hasn’t a word or element out of place and completes itself perfectly.
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What an important and touching poem, Robi!
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Thank you for this enlightening and thought-provoking poem, Robbi!
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This is a Robbi poem that forces us to be thoughtful. It’s not just the Jewish traditions, it’s what happens to all of us, through the generations, intentionally or by neglect. Or, perhaps, traditions just run their course. A melancholic poem, and yet a poem of hope and a future where, perhaps, one day we can all come together as one.
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Well-said, Rose Mary. Thank you!
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You convey the sadness and richness of this shared history.
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Thank you for sharing this love-inspired poem of traditions. Robbi Nester’s adaptations of an earlier form of worship, speak to an inner wisdom. This is an example, too, of a dilemma at the heart of most religions, whose theologians and practitioners of their faith strive to remain connected to their forms, but also relevant, and just.
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Yes, taking ancient texts and rituals and applying them to contemporay society is the calling of every religion.
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Fine poem, dear Robbi.
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love this view of generational differences, Roby, and appreciate the window into gendered differences in that tradition, which complicate the losses. Because your speaker clearly transcended the idea of that “educating women is a waste.“ This is an ambiguous loss than, and a poem so clearly captures that.
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Sorry about the name, spelling, Robi. I used dictation, and didn’t proof well.
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Lovely to see you fine poetry here today Robbi
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