Response to Reading 9

The poem A City of Stone by Ali Qlibo is a beautiful depiction of the multifaceted city of Jersualem. He illustrates how the past has an influential nature to the present because of the diverse and rich history that the city is steeped in. This connection between history and the present is made with the ever present historical edifices that engulf the city as they are an identifying character of the cultures that make up Jerusalem. Also reading the Wounded Spirits in a Promised Land by David Shipler there is an illustration of that the parties in Jerusalem are sort of one in the same as all of the devote rise in early in the morning to praise their God. The article also reiterates the cultural complexities and identity of the city through the swinging pendulum of extremes. The author makes a very powerful and poignant statement that through all the history of the city and wisdom cultivated there, that there is nothing but bloodshed that has stemmed. To a point this is true Jerusalem is an old city whose wisdom has given rise to eternal violence and rage that permeates in from the past to the present.