ART & POETRY SAMPLES

Upcoming Publications:
* Artwork by Stav will be published in "AJS Perspectives: The Magazine of the Association for Jewish Studies" - Summer 2025: The Rainbow Issue.
* Two Hebrew poems by Stav will be published in "Ho! Literary Magazine", upcoming vol. 29 "Myths" (Summer 2025)

For pricing inquiries and commissioning poems, contact........

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​Self-Portrait of a UK Immigrant in Lockdown on Election Day in Her Homeland (2021)
(Winner: 3rd Place, Long-Distance Poetry Competition)

She didn't sleep all night because her fallopian tubes are assholes
She cried all morning because she misses her grandma
Who is just as depressed as her today, so she said on the phone
​
And she's feeling guilty because she is so very far away
And because today is the 4th National Election in the span of two years
And once again she's not there to do her part for her country

Her country, which she still calls home despite everything
The first time she came across a dreidel in the diaspora
She laughed — there must be a mistake

It’s supposed to say “A Great Miracle Happened Here”!
She laughed at the goyim, fools, they probably used Google Translate
And manufactured an entire line of faulty dreidels

And then she understood that she’s the fool here
“A Great Miracle Happened There”, because she’s no longer
Here she purchased the most British cardigan ever

An oversized cable knit brown cardigan, with deep pockets
And wooden buttons. She will go on a walk
That’s what the Brits do here
 
Later, in the kitchen, sipping on a cup of English tea
She makes tahini in the food processor
Adding water, lemon, and fresh garlic
​
Searching for the perfect balance
Between solid and liquid, sour and savoury,
Between here and there.

"Uprooted" (2021): Collage made of photographs by Arno Rafael Minkkinen and photographs by Stav Meishar, engaging with Minkkinen’s work through a Jewish lens

Judges' Commentary:
"A convincing, existential poem about the experience of distance as it echoes in a woman living in diaspora - both here and there, neither here nor there. Like the dreidel experiencing confusion in diaspora, not sure if it is here or there, distance is embodied in every circle: 
The physical circle - a physical pain in a foreign space; the family circle - missing her grandma to tears; and the national circle - the feeling of guilt, amplified on the day of elections.
​The poem remains life-sized and does not presume to offer magic solutions nor big conclusions beyond seeking balance between doing 'what the Brits do here' and a sensory insistence to find home by making 'tahini in the food processor.'"

"Home is Where" (2025): Collage

"Medusa's Scream" (2025): Needle felting, beads, ribbon

Medusa (2024)

I cannot recall
The first time I felt them
Looking at me
Measuring me, treasuring me
Like a prize to be won
Their gaze roaming my body
Assessing every inch
From my hair
Down to my feet
Their eyes are sand paper, scraping
Their gaze filing me down
Making me small.

I went to the Temple of Athena
Seeking advice, comfort.
Goddess of wisdom
Tell me what I should do-
And it was there Poseidon found me.

Forcibly he grabbed the waves of my hair
As if grabbing his horses' reigns
Making me foam at the lips
And grunting in my ears
About my sea-blue eyes.

Later she found me
Draped unconscious upon her altar
My blood defiling her temple
And they say that in her divine,
Omnipotent wrath, she punished me:
Turning my hair to snakes
My blue eyes - to danger

So they say,
The ignorant fools,
Not understanding.
Their male gaze blind
To justice served by a woman:

All who look upon me will turn into stone
And since, nobody looks upon me

Not even Poseidon
Although the waves
Lap at my bare feet
And the salt scraping my skin
Softens and smoothes me
Like an eel

I walk upon the shore
Looking out at the sea, as blue as my eyes
My snakes twisting around me
Free to walk as I please
Head held high.

"Floating", a trinket dish and decorative stones (2025): Clay, acrylic paint

All is Temporary (2025)

I yearn to embed myself in your ribsBurying my head in your chest
Hugging you close to me
You are a part of me.
But also, I know:
It's only for now.
In this one life
All is temporary

All is temporary
In this one life
It's only for now.
But also, I know:
You are a part of me.
Hugging you close to me
Burying my head in your chest
​I yearn to embed myself in your ribs

"Over the Surface of the Deep" (2025): Diorama

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"Strange Beauty" (2022): Live Art / Performance Installation, part of "We Are Invisible We Are Visible", The Arnolfini Bristol