Award-winning internationally published writer and poet Howard Debs makes the case as to why the poet’s voice matters, now more than ever.

1. The Voice
of the Jewish
Poet:
From King David
to Today

2. “art has judged the judges, pleaded revenge to the innocent and shown
to the future what the past suffered, so that it has never been forgotten.”
― John Berger
Award-winning
internationally published
writer and poet Howard Debs
makes the case as to why the
poet’s voice matters, now
more than ever.

3. “The hand of any poem is open” ― Nick Laird
addressing the poet’s function as
witness, as ba’al tekiah sounding the
clarion call, he explores the lineage
of the Jewish poet from biblical
times to today presenting readings
from varied sources and his own new
book Gallery: A Collection of Pictures
and Words

4. “Art is not a mirror held up to reality
but a hammer with which to shape it.”
― Bertolt Brecht
What they’re saying. . .
“a powerful lesson about the poetry of bearing witness.”
— Greenwood Writer's Guild
"Congratulations on all your work. It's very impressive."
— Jakub Nowakowski, Director, Galicia Jewish Museum
Kraków, Poland
" ‘Terezin’ is terrific.”
—Daniel Menaker, writer and editor, former Executive
Editor-in-Chief, Random House
“Your poems, photos, commentary are all terrific, deeply
affecting. Looking forward to. . .more.”
—Trish Saunders, Poet

5. Bio
Howard Richard Debs is a poet, writer, photographer, sometime artist, musician, singer/songwriter. The mentor
of his youth Rabbi Louis Katzoff, (ZT”L) was founding editor of Dor le Dor of the World Jewish Bible Society. At
age 15 he won a B’nai B’rith oratory competition devoted to the theme “More than Israel has kept the
Sabbath, the Sabbath has kept Israel.” He studied philosophy and while taking courses at what was then the
College of Jewish Studies in Chicago he became and remains intensely interested in the writings of the
medieval Jewish thinkers, who also were often poets and mystics steeped in what would become known as
Kabbalah. At age 19 he received a University of Colorado Poetry Prize; after spending the past 50 years in the
field of communications with recognitions including a Distinguished Achievement Award from the Educational
Press Association of America, he resumed his creative pursuits. His essays, fiction, and poetry appear
internationally in numerous publications and anthologies. He considers his greatest honor to be an invitation
to submit his poetry to be considered for the new Prayer book of The Rabbinical Assembly. He is a finalist and
recipient of the 28th Annual 2015 Anna Davidson Rosenberg Poetry Awards for Poems on the Jewish
Experience. his essay “The Poetry of Bearing Witness” appearing in On Being - On The Blog, includes “Terezin:
Trilogy Of Names” from his Holocaust Poetry Series; his photography appears in select publications, including in
Rattle online as guest artist and editor; his new full length work is Gallery: A Collection of Pictures and Words
(Scarlet Leaf Publishing). He is now hard at work on his anthology project New Voices from Salvaged Words: an
Anthology of Contemporary Holocaust Poetry and Essays with co-editor Matthew E. Silverman, fellow poet,
editor of Blue Lyra Review, and co-editor of The Bloomsbury Anthology of Contemporary Jewish American
Poetry. Born and bred in Chicago, Howard now lives in sunny South Florida with his wife of 51 years Sheila,
where they spend considerable time spoiling their four grandchildren. He is listed in the Directory of American
Poets & Writers : https://www.pw.org/content/howard_debs

6. Contact
For information about presentations and readings please contact the author via email at
hrdebs@gmail.com or through the contact form on his website:
https://communicatorsandcommunications.com/contact/
“In this era of fake news and tweets, with knowledge being
devalued in many places, we need, more than ever, to rely on
humanity’s history in all its truth, both the ugly and exemplary, to
guide our decisions about what is happening around us, pointing
where we might be headed.” from the author’s essay “The New
Wave of Anti-Semitism: Lest We Forget” published in Reform
Judaism