About the Book

Chana Bloch’s collection of new and selected poetry explores a retrospective view on Jewish texts and traditions, illness, death, gender, memory, and family life.

Praise for Swimming in the Rain

Chana Bloch has spent her life writing the poems of a grown woman, loving the world as she interrogates it mercilessly, speaking a truth that hurts as it heals. “Half the stories/ I used to believe are false,” she confesses. “Thank God/ I’ve got the good sense at last/ not to come in out of the rain.” A thrilling collection.
—Dorianne Laux 

Chana Bloch is an absolutely essential poet, with a breathtaking gift for spanning, linking and leaping—unforgettable images, wonderments, and wisdom. Her words travel with me at the center of my compass. This collection is a triumph, not to be missed.
—Naomi Shihab Nye 

Chana Bloch is writing the best poems of her life. Death is the Great Master hovering in the distance, but this pleasure-loving poet will not be deterred. Chana Bloch is like a Japanese potter mending the cracked and dinged pottery of experience with gold powder sprinkled from her fingers.
—Henri Cole 

Chana Bloch (1940-2017) was a poet, translator, scholar, and teacher. During her lifetime she authored six books of poems and six books of translations of Hebrew poetry both ancient and contemporary. She also authored a critical study on George Herbert. Bloch was professor emerita of English literature and creative writing at Mills College, where she […]

Learn More

Related Books