Self-Portrait with Ghosts of the Diaspora

How do we honor our dead and remember where we come from? Self-Portrait with Ghosts of the Diaspora is a memorial and a map, a pile of stones on the graves of Meghan Sterling's Jewish ancestors. A testament to what is said and what is unsaid, these poems are woven with bits of stories she overheard or invented as a child. Self-Portrait with Ghosts of the Diaspora braids poems detailing Sterling's life in modern-day America as a secular Jew raising her daughter, named after her beloved grandmother, with poems of her great-grandparents' and grandparents' experiences navigating a new country after fleeing wars across the ocean. In this collection, Sterling offers a glimpse into a fading history.