Intercultural Matriarchal Figures in Gershon's "Ruth" and
             Gershon uses biblical midrash to reexamine the place of the
             matriarchal figure after the Shoah. Both poems center on one
             central female from the bible, although one is identified as a
             Jew, while one is identified as furthering the lineage of
             Christ. Both poems give these women the power of choice, which
             they do not have in the typical biblical text. Both poems show
             the power of man as motivation over the power of God. Although
             there is an absence of the God figure in Ruth, it is present in
             "Esther." Gershon enters, through her poetry, these separate
             In the first stanza of "Ruth," we learn that Ruth descends from
             a line of Christians, which immediately contrasts to the
             speaker's religion, in the form of Gershon. Although the speaker
             and Ruth share different religions they have many things in
             common. The first example of this is in the line "She preferred
             exile to being alone," (Gershon, 4) whereby, even though the
             exile of Gershon's people was not voluntary, both Gershon and
             Ruth share the experience of exile. The idea of being a
             "stranger" is shared by both the speaker and Ruth. This is the
             first time where the speaker enters into Ruth's character. At
             the end of the second major verse paragraph, the speaker is
             speculating on Ruth's feelings, saying "Did she feel, I have
             come home (Gershon, 10)?" This line exhibits both the mutual
             feelings shared and the idea of a home that is unnatural, or one
             that has to be rebuilt. This idea is furthered in the second
             section where Ruth looks to her birthplace but knows she cannot
             The second and fourth sections of this poem deal with the
             aspects of trying to live an ordinary existence under the
             conditions of being a "stranger." Aspects of life that should be
             natural, such as sleeping and mothering, are unable to be done
             by those who ...