Psychotherapist Paulette Rochelle-Levy invites the reader to “take off your shoes, take off your shoes and dare to cross into the not too deep, not too cold rushing water of the springtime river.” Through poems, prayers, and reflections Paulette takes you through her life's journey. The chapters invite you to muse on your own aliveness and the idea of longing, loss, and healing.  This unique memoir has humor, praise, and so many of the emotions humans live through.
Rochelle-Levy wrote this book during the pandemic. The worldwide experience and private experience prompted her to write something more personal. Something less basic than what she had written before. Each chapter has a short discussion on the idea, and then the chapter is filled with poems and prayers. While that sounds perfectly organized, there is chaos within the book that confused me as she bounces around in a stream of consciousness.
I enjoyed reading about her experience with religion. She includes a celebration of Dance as Prayer and prayer-poems in the Jewish tradition. I enjoyed her relationship with spirituality, and I loved reading her Jewish perspective. I loved the Dance as Prayer section and look forward to applying it to my own religion.
I received an electronic ARC (all opinions are my own) but it was not well-formatted. It caused some confusion about what lines went with which program. But I believe the written version negates this and reads nicely.
Throughout the prose, poetry, and prayers. Rochelle-Levy reveals her odyssey with the universal and its mystical expression.

I would like to have read this in paper form as the uncorrected kindle proof I had messed with the formatting somewhat so there were places where I had to mentally rearrange the layout to figure out whether particular bits were prose or poetry. I'm sure this will be sorted in the final drafts. On the whole I enjoyed reading this. As with any book of poetry there were some poems that resonated strongly and others that didn't at all. I enjoyed the author's reflections at the beginning of each chapter.

Other reviewers refer to this being a book of Jewish poetry, but as someone who doesn't define my faith according to any one religion I personally think it can be non-denominational. My favourite parts were these excerpts from the chapter "On Time":

What if I could pause
from rushing through Time
And cease viewing
Time as an avaricious competitor
Mocking my every attempt
To do it all, to get it all done
All at once

and

What if time is not an adversary
But rather a generous gift
A lavish offering
That asks only
That I say,
"Thanks
I'll use it well."

This was a great book of reflection and poetry. This woman definitely has had a long and wonderful life and it shows in her writings. I would share with book with family and friends.

This book was recieved as an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you, NetGalley for a chance to read and review this.

While this is a nice collection, it's not one that I can relate to. Poetry is really a matter of taste, but this is not to mine. However, I can recognise that a lot of people may feel vert differently about this book! I wish the author luck on their future endeavours!

I was excited to see a book of Jewish poetry come out recently. Reading the collection, I felt that I (mid-20s and Jewish) was just much younger than the intended audience for the book. The poems were familiar and comforting to read through, full of Jewish experiences of seasons, friendships, and aging. I found myself skimming through the prose introducing each chapter. I think that older Jewish readers would enjoy this, especially those who also enjoy Jewish mysticism and poetry.