Help.

I'm trapped between a monster and a demon.

The monster is a ravenous black hole, fleshy and pulsating.

The demon is invisible, but I can hear her constantly whispering, moaning, infiltrating my electromagnetic field, sending me messages through my flickering screen.

Let me explain:

I'm going to try to write myself out of this conundrum. I'm going to search for a so called arsenic to lure out the demon behind this text which is this city which is a monster which is my body: writing as exorcism, or maybe as a way to extract a microchip I suspect they have implanted inside me.

MIFLEZETAmital SternApril 11, 2018Amital Stern, Jerusalem Comment

Shame and Longing in Jerusalem

MIFLEZET is standing on the corner, beside a stone arch that leads from the marketplace to the narrow alleyways of the neighborhood in which she lives.

We zoom in on the long raggedy red sweater she's wearing, thrown on top of ammonia stained sweats, basically (admit it) her pajamas.

She has just bumped into an old friend.

In the background, as they catch up, loudspeakers blast words of mourning, perhaps for the illustrious rabbi who died yesterday, and whose funeral procession will depart from just down the road.

Tens, no, hundreds, of ultra-Orthodox men and boys, are - she wants to think of a more neutral word, but this is the one that emerges: swarming- through the arch, towards the procession.

As they pass by MIFLEZET and her old friend, the men and boys remove their black hats and cover their faces.

MIFLEZETAmital SternMarch 14, 2018Amital SternComment