G-d’s Optimism 
Yehoshua November
Main Street Rag Publishing
61 pp. $14.00

(lubavitch.com) In the foreword to this remarkable book of poetry, a teacher and friend recalls her first memory of the author, Yehoshua November, as a student in her introductory poetry university course. She had posed an opening question to the budding poets: why do you write poetry? He stunned the class by replying, “I want to restore the sanctity to language.” 

This volume, G-d’s Optimism, shows that he has held to his goal and, at least in this little corner of the language, he has succeeded.

In our Book of Books, the word is a sacred thing, for it is G-d’s vehicle for creating the world – “He spoke and it came to be” – and for informing us of His purpose in the world and in us. This revelation of Self is understood in our prayer book as love – a great love, an eternal love, a love of the world and all He has trusted that, through us, it can be. While G-d’s words are filled with a palpable sense of mystery that only grows with familiarity, the words also bear plain and simple meaning, so that they can enter our minds and hearts.

November faithfully follows the divine model, adding to it the gift of his conscious appreciation of sanctified language and of his response to it. He speaks of plain and familiar things directly; his words do not get in the way. And as he does so, we sense the sacred present in those things, or yearning to be present though presently missing. He does not veer into either of the polarities that profane poetry. He does not engage in obscurities; and he does not fail to engage the challenge of numinous mystery. 

He is not among those who use complexity of technique, language or ideation to hide the fact that they are sharing nothing.  He speaks plainly, in the very best sense of that adverb. He wants you to know what he means and is not afraid to take you into his intimate confidence.  

That confidence is worth sharing. November is not only an observer of the interplay of the holy and the day-to-day – he is a deeply committed participant in it. He knows it. He is not indifferent about its outcome, but shares with you his passion and engagement. He observes love, and reports honestly its bafflements, its trials, its hopes and its wonder. But the reportage is part of his participation, not a removal from it. The poems are works of love in the full sense that they are clearly an expression of November’s choice to love, as the focus of his service of G-d. And they clearly invoke love in the reader’s life – it is difficult to read these poems at a distance. The poet draws us into the love, gently but firmly.

Sometimes the love is in its most palpable and direct form, a wondering reflection on his marriage to “the dark-haired daughter . . . chosen for me before I took up this journey" (Before I Took Up This Journey). Marriage reveals itself in these poems as a supreme mode of engagement with G-d. The passions and the temptations, all of which November faithfully reports with candor and with honor, lead to a knowledge of mystery at the heart of the familiar, that the familiar is in itself, at root, mysterious, uncontrollable – and the place in which G-d reveals His yearning to be present and to be known.

Since Torah is G-d’s revelation, and that revelation is of His Self and Essence, this is Torah. This writing therefore meets the highest standard, a daunting imperative which itself becomes poetry in “A Jewish Poet”: “And every day you have to ask yourself why you are writing/ when there already is the one great book.” 

This is a noble acknowledgement. It is both typical (of this poet) and remarkable that he is not content even with noble religiosity, but realizes his obligation to go beyond cliché. He knows from the start that: “You cannot say anything about G-d/ that will offend the disbelievers.” Who will not admit, after all, that piety must engage even its opponents with love? November uses that only as a starting point; his musement brings him finally to this: “You cannot say anything about the disbelievers,/ which might offend G-d.”

G-d’s Optimism is filled to the brim with love, with Torah, with an offering and a revealing of heart, mind and even more— a revelation of that sacred elusive essence of soul/spirit/self.  The reader of this will know that there, in these poems, language has been restored, redeemed and sanctified. And I believe that the effect of reading these poems will not end there, but will stir a deep desire join in speaking from such depth, and with such authentic love.

God’s Optimism is Yehoshua November’s debut poetry collection. In addition to winning the MSR Poetry Book Award, it was named a finalist for the Autumn House Poetry Prize and the Tampa Review Prize for Poetry. November teaches writing at Rutgers University and Touro College, and his work has appeared in The Sun, Prairie Schooner, Margie, The Forward, and other publications. His poetry has been anthologized, nominated for a Pushcart Prize, and selected as the winner of Prairie Schooner’s Bernice Slote Award. He lives with his family in Morristown, NJ.