Zelda was a religious, spiritual Jewish poet who attracted secular readers too. Born in 1914 in Chernigoff, the Ukraine; she died at the age of 70 in Jerusalem.

Zelda (Shneurson Mishkovsky), who published her books using only her first name, was born to a religious family in the Ukraine. Her father and grandfather were Hasidic rabbis and her mother, devoutly Orthodox, was at the same time well-read in modern Hebrew, Russian, and European literature.

Zelda's parents moved to Jerusalem in 1926, when she was 12. Shortly after the move, her grandfather and her father both died. She studied at a religious school for girls and then attended a teacher?s seminary, when she started writing poetry. Later on she moved with her mother to Tel-Aviv, where she studied art and painting, but never completed her studies. Her mother remarried and moved to Haifa with her husband.

In 1935, Zelda went back to Jerusalem, to pursue her dreams of painting, but when her mother fell ill, Zelda joined her in Haifa. After moving to Haifa she worked with handicapped children. Following the death of her mother's second husband, both women moved back to Jerusalem and settled there (in Kerem Avraham). Shortly after Zelda married Chayim Arye Mishkovsky, who moved in with her and her mother. He encouraged her to publish her poetry and in 1967, her first book was published to great acclaim. It was dedicated to her Mother and Father and included poems she wrote in her childhood years.

Her second book was published in 1971, shortly after Chayim's death, and was dedicated to him. Always personal in her writing, many of the poems were about her husband, all filled with sorrow of his death, that Zelda felt until her dying day. She also wrote about her neighbours and her surroundings. After her husband?s death she dedicated herself mainly to teaching and writing. Four other books were published later on.

Five years after being widowed, Zelda moved to another area of Jerusalem that was on the border between religious and secular neighbourhoods (Rechavia). The change seemed to benefit her, and she made new friends, many of them secular, who frequently visited her in her home. Her poems have become more cheerful after this move, as she had more daylight coming into her flat, which seemed to make a big difference to her mood.

Chayim and Zelda had no children, but she surrounded herself with friends, many of them female students that lived in her flat during their university years and she supported financially. Her last book was accordingly dedicated to 'the friends of my soul', and was finished shortly before her death. Many of those students came back with their families to part with her in her last days.

After her work began to appear in 1967, she gained many faithful readers from all sectors of Israeli society. Her poetry, which is highly spiritual, and at the same time very direct, colorful and precise, succeeded in touching the hearts of both religious and secular people, old and young, men and women alike. A lot of her symbolisms are related to nature and personal topics, the people in her life, her family and neighbours.
Zelda published six volumes of poetry altogether and was awarded the prestigious Bialik Prize. A complete collection of her work has been published posthumously.

Each of us has a name

given by the sea

and given by

our death