Poetry Overview

Poetry Anthologies

A selection of poems by Mati Shemoelof published in literary magazines, journals, anthologies, art catalogues and international poetry platforms in Hebrew, German, English, Arabic, Italian, Spanish, Ukranian and Turkish.

2026

“The Geranium Is Optimistic This Morning” is a poem by Mati Shemoelof, published in Issue 31 of the literary journal Ho!, dedicated to the animal, plant and inanimate worlds.

Mati Shemoelof’s poem “Die Amal braucht die Mutigen Frauen” reflects on revenge, loss, mourning and hope. The German poem is accompanied by an Arabic translation by Thaer Ayoub. 4-0. Die Amal braucht die Mutigen Frauen, Bridges גשרים Brücken لجسور Magazine, Berlin (Aphorisma Verlag). ISBN 978-3-86575-734-0.

Mati Shemoelof’s German poem “Als wir euch durch das Gewehrvisier betrachteten” with its Arabic translation by Thaer Ayoub, published in Bridges Magazine.

A German poem by Mati Shemoelof about bodies, memory, childhood, death and the green of life, published in AphorismA Bulletin 30.

Two poems by Mati Shemoelof, published in the Hebrew literary issue Hakiyum Hameshutaf (“Shared Existence”), edited by Ilan Sheinfeld.

A few of my poems were translated into Ukrainian by Petro Rychlo for the XVII Meridian Czernowitz Poetry Festival

• My poems in English - Two poems from Bagdad | Haifa | Berlin published by Creative Writing at Leicester. University of Leicester

2025

“No Bird Sees” is a poem by Mati Shemoelof about a Palestinian child, grief, displacement, memory and the human cost of war, translated into German for stadtsprachen magazin. No bird sees (German, English and Hebrew), Stadtsprachen magazine 32.

Efe Duyan translated and published my poems, on the Turkish magazine Cargalak magazine.

• The poem “No bird sees” was published on Butterflies in Gaza: A World Anthology of Poems on Peace.

2024

• These alps, Stadtsprachen magazine, vloume 27

• “The day after”, “Gaza war”, Helicon literary journal, Editing by Navit Barel (Hebrew)

2023

• “Babylon Berlijn - Je Zult De Toren Van Babel Met Heel Je Hart Leifhebben In Gebroken Taal” (Vertaling: Sylvie Hoyinck), Terras Magazine - “Babel”, Volume 24, 2023. ISBN: 9789083216041

• A stop on the right time, Helicon literary journal, Editing by Navit Barel (Hebrew)

• Resistance, edited by Ilan Seinfeld (Hebrew)

2021

• Mati Shemoelof’s poem “Can’t Prostrate Myself at My Grandmother’s Grave” was published in Banipal 72: Magazine of Modern Arab Literature, a special issue devoted to Iraqi Jewish writers. Translated from Hebrew into English by Eran Edry, the poem is dedicated to Shemoelof’s grandmother, Rachel Hazzaz, who died on 22 March 2020. Moving between Baghdad, Haifa and Germany, the poem explores memory, migration, language, family and the experience of exile. The grandmother’s home, food, Iraqi language and Jewish traditions become fragments of a disappearing world that are carried across generations and transformed through poetry. The poem reflects on the inheritance of Iraqi Jewish memory and on the experience of raising a child in Germany while carrying memories of a family history rooted in Iraq and Israel. It considers the relationship between place and belonging, and the ways poetry can preserve a home that no longer exists. Published in Banipal 72 – Iraqi Jewish Writers.

• Gedicht no. 5, Herzattacke II/2021: Literatur- und Kunstzeitschrift/ dreiunddreißigster Jahrgang.

• Two Hebrew translation to the poems of David Berman. Stadtsprachen Magazine.

• Jerusalem (Traduction de Michel Eckhard Elial), LEMONDE DES VILLES // Jerusalem. (Little big book artist: peintures et poesies, Voltje Editions, France.

2020

• The poems “The state of contemporary poetry” and  “danger” were published on StadtSprachen Magazine no. 15.

• Four poems - Templehofer Park, Words and worlds magazine - / Worte & Welten - An Austrian bilingual magazine for migrant literature, Spring issue.

• Four poems, Bombay Review, Issue 28, Jan-Feb.

2019

From reading poems in Gaza to celebrating with his grandmother in Baghdad, Mati Shemoelof imagines a different future for Israel and the Middle East: one shaped by peace, freedom and the movement of people across borders.

• “Why don’t i write Israeli love poems”, Grand Tour: Reisen durch die junge Lyrik Europas, Herausgegeben von Federico Italiano and Jan Wagner, Hanser Verlag, 2019, page 201, (German and Hebrew).

• Gaza II, Requiem pour Gaza, Colour gang publishers (Paris with an intro from Adunis Ali Ahmad Said Esber).

• “The words of departure” appeared in „A wie Jüdisch: In 22 Buchstaben durch die Gegenwart.“ - An exhibition in the Jewish museum in Berlin. 2018-2019. (English, Hebrew and German).

2018

• Thinking about Israel, TextLand Magazine, 2.11.2018. (English).

• Straight fundamentalism, B/G Magazine, 2.7.2018. (English).

• Moonlight tale, Ygdrasil magazine, VOL XXV!, Issue 7, Number 303, 2018, (English).

• And I regret that I missed a way to his heart, Ygdrasil magazine, VOL XXV!, Issue 7, Number 303, 2018, (English).

• And the eyes of my brother, Benjamin, Ygdrasil magazine, VOL XXV!, Issue 7, Number 303, 2018, (English).

• Crooked god machine, Ygdrasil magazine, VOL XXV!, Issue 7, Number 303, 2018, (English).

• Disaster begins at a business lunch, Ygdrasil magazine, VOL XXV!, Issue 7, Number 303, 2018, (English).

• The Poem is the safest place, Ygdrasil magazine, VOL XXV!, Issue 7, Number 303, 2018, (English).

• Straight fundamentalism, Ygdrasil magazine, VOL XXV!, Issue 7, Number 303, 2018, (English).

• Some words in Hebrew just can't be translated, Ygdrasil magazine, VOL XXV!, Issue 7, Number 303, 2018, (English).

• There Was Never a Home in Poetry, Ygdrasil magazine, VOL XXV!, Issue 7, Number 303, 2018, (English).

• Downstairs, From heavenly Aleppo, Rigorous Magazine. Volume Two, Issue 1, 2018 (English).

• And I regret that I missed a way to his heart, Rigorous Magazine. Volume Two, Issue 1, 2018 (English).

• And we were the Savage Poets, Rigorous Magazine. Volume Two, Issue 1, 2018 (English).

• There Was Never a Home in Poetry, Rigorous Magazine. Volume Two, Issue 1, 2018 (English).

• Breaking Passports, Rigorous Magazine. Volume Two, Issue 1, 2018 (English).

• On the other side of the Poetry, Rigorous Magazine. Volume Two, Issue 1, 2018 (English).

  
  

  2017

“Your stories will come back to my ears, like a child who sits on his grandmother’s knees.” In this poem, Mati Shemoelof addresses Aleppo as a city of memory, poetry and Arab-Jewish heritage. Mourning its destruction and the displacement of its people, he imagines a future built not with weapons but with words, compassion and freedom.

Read “Remembering Your Golden Years: Elegy for George Michael,” a poem by Mati Shemoelof published in the 2017 literary fanzine Issues.

2016

• A Poem for Revolutions - Mati Shemoelof’s poem connects the destruction of Kfar Shalem and the displacement of Jaffa’s residents with the Egyptian uprising of January 2011, calling for solidarity against the forces that erase people’s histories. First published on 30 January 2011, in +972 Magazine.
  
  

2015

• “The Cause of My Death: Too Many Love Songs”. Cultural buzz. 2015 (English).

• “Jerusalem”, “Jerusalem Celestial: Jerusalem Terrenal“, An anthology Edited by: Yaron Avitov, Amadeus, 2015 (Spanish).

  
  2014

“An Arab-Jew in Berlin” is one of the first poems i wrote after immigrating to Berlin.

• 2013

• Poems. Anisa Ashkar’s Art Catalog. 2013 (Arabic and Hebrew).

  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  2012

• Selected Poems were translated to German on “Lyrikline” Site. 2012 (German, Arabic, Italian, Hebrew and English).

  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  2011

• “In an Entire Ruined Village and at the Jaffa Expulsion” by “Zeek” Magazine. 2011 (English).

  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  2010

• “Why Don’t I Write Israeli Love Songs”, Fusion - Big Bridge Magazine. 2010 (English).

  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  2007

• The Poem “Ballad of the Middle of the Twenty First Century”, “Märchenland: Die beteiligten Autoren setzten sich mit den Märchen der Gebrüder Grimm auseinander, brachten ihre prosaische Form auf eine lyrische Ebene und begaben sich in die mitunter ambivalenten Bereiche des kulturellen Gedächtnisses in Deutschland und Israel.” 2007. German).

More - Mati Shemoelof poetry

Tags- Mati Shemoelof poems, Mati Shemoelof poetry, poetry anthologies, Israeli poetry, Mizrahi poetry, Jewish Arab poetry, Hebrew poetry, German poetry, contemporary Hebrew poets, Mati Shemoelof publications