Devorah B. Harris
Publishing Name
Current City, State, Country
Birth City, State, Country
Biography
As a young woman, Devorah studied at Mt Zion Temple in St. Paul, MN under the brilliant Rabbi Frederick Schwartz. He introduced her to the work of Martin Buber and the belief we can connect to our lives in a deeper level sitting under the trees studying Torah on Shabbat.
Devorah was also fortunate to have been under the guidance and incendiary leadership of Debbie Friedman at Olin Sang Ruby Union Institute (OSRUI). Being Debbie’s camper, neighbor and life-long friend, Debbie taught that every word mattered and everyone has a voice.
From The University of Minnesota Devorah earned degrees in Theater, in English lit, Jewish Studies and Secondary Education. Taught by Toni McNaron, Devorah was part of a year long curriculum studying the work of Adrianne Rich. Years later, living in San Francisco Devorah hosted Adrianne Rich to Passover dinner.
As a regular High School English teacher, Devorah saw all too often how books underrepresented and misconstrued minorities. She created a yearlong course for eighth graders on the study of the Holocaust at Mount Zion Temple in Saint Paul Minnesota. It was the late 70’s and she was asked to defend the course as an ongoing part of the eighth-grade curriculum against parents who did not understand its importance. She taught her students not only to be educated but to be ready to stand up and educate when cults entered their city that spring, spreading false information about Jews.
Devorah developed and taught a high school elective called “Juicy Jewish Lit” an always popular elective and great fun to teach. Devorah staged theatrical programs and taught classes using improvisation for kids to recreate and imagine the choices our people of the Torah faced in each parshot.
In its early days, Devorah was instrumental in helping build and expand Minnesota’s well-loved, LOFT, A Place for Literature and the Arts. Devorah founded Northwords Women Poets of Minnesota and DreamPoets of Santa Cruz, CA when she moved to CA. She is a proud member of AWA, Amherst Writers and Artists, SPIN, Silk Painters International, The International Voices of Israel, and especially, Yetzirah.
Devorah’s first published poem “ A Most Traditional Denial” was published in Lilith magazine in 1985. She discovered her poem was being read on bimahs around the country especially at women’s Bat Mitzvah ceremonies. That her poem spoke to others across the country, made her understand the importance of publishing. Devorah left Minnesota and moved to the West Coast eager to break into publishing and help create better books. Over many decades working in marketing, sales and editorial, Devorah loved her publishing career first at Harper & Row then Houghton Mifflin Publishers.
Currently Devorah writes from her home on Elkhorn Slough, a nationally loved reservoir in North Monterey County with her husband. Devorah hand paints one-of-a-kind silk Judaica creating scarves, challah covers and prayer shawls using stretcher bars and French dyes.
What is the relationship between Judaism and/or Jewish culture and your poetry?
Devorah has always felt that the language of her soul was Jewish, despite not knowing the language or the history of her people.
It took leaving the United States for Israel at the young age of seventeen and uncovering the secrets her father’s family had kept hidden for her to fully appreciate the richness of her Jewishness. (This journey is the current subject of Devorah’s memoir writing.)
Poetry gives her the words to illuminate the stirrings of her Jewish heart, and poetry restores the humming of her Jewish soul again and again.
Published Works
Poems
“An Elegy for Judy,” “Tool,” “Our Island” (Raven’s Perch, 2025)
“Over Easy” (Quartet, Spring 2025)
“The Women’s Side of Theresienstadt” (Naugatuck River Review, Fall 2025)
“Grand Baroque” (The Feathered Violin)
“Artifacts” (Identity)
“Delicate Ruminations,” “Grand Baroque” (QUORUM Editions)
“On the Wire” (Ragmag (Unicorn’s Den))
“Doubletalk,” “To My Eighth Grade Class” (The English Journal)
“Crossing Line,” “Hot Fudge Sunday” (Truly Fine Press)
“Loon Tune” (Up Against the Wall, Mother)
“Body Language” (WomanSpirit)
“A Most Traditional Denial” (Lilith, 1985)