#BlogElulDay 15

 Change

Summer creeps toward autumn

muting her colors, bringing a descent

of light, a rush toward dusk

Yet, a few days stay behind

unwilling to keep step

They capture summer’s warmth,

a reprieve, a chance to linger

##BlogElul Day 13

Remember

Before—

always before

Looking backwards

to recall a time before the now

A palmist reads shapes and lines,

hand shapes, fingernails, texture of skin

to create a text of what story remains

Scripture retells a narrative,

a history of a people, a key to remember 

our ancestors

#BlogElul Day 12

Forgive

To forgive

does not mean to forget

or blot out from memory

Some words remain

Some actions stay embedded

To forgive

does not mean to issue a free pass

or to engage in magic thinking

To me it means that I will

not carry around a lodestone

weighing me down

I will forgive words and actions 

but it doesn’t mean I will respect

or condone or not call out

I will not wait for you to ask

for forgiveness

It will be a free gift

A gift I will accept as well 

#BlogElul Day 11

 Trust

In a temperate zone

it is a cycle of promises—

spring will appear and wipe

away reminders of winter—

the pile of snow that resists melting,

icicles hanging off the roof edge

and bushes bent from the weight of winter

Spring is not happenstance 

nor a fortunate phenomenon 

or based on mathematical probability

nor the rermedy for Demeter’s 

design for winter—instead

spring is woven from 

the thread of creation 

#BlogElul Day 10

Count

Each day I count my tomatoes,

check to see a change from green 

When I walk up and down hills

my watch counts my steps, my pulse

rate, distance in miles, time—

It keeps a record of my longest walk,

my speed—even calories used

If I  count those times, 

I let myself down—an errant word,

hyperbole, a reconstructed story 

with missing parts, and the times I

looked away, invisible to myself—

too busy to count the hollow 

places in need of repair

#BlogElul 9

     To See

My eyes only see

innocence when I root out

common unkindness

#BlogElul Day 8

 Hear

          “I am my prayer.”

           Va’ani Tefilati

my grandfather

faced the open window 

and looked beyond 

his street, past the boys

playing stickball,

past the girls jumping rope

 miming each action

     Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear

     Turn around,

     Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear

     Touch the ground

past the sounds of women

playing mahjong,

calling out their tiles

Dragons, Flowers, Seasons,

the Four Winds

in a staccato rendition

Past the Snow Cone man

selling flavored shaved ice

     My grandfather David davens

     and ancient prayers 

     echo across time 

     I listen—

     hear my lineage

     and pray

 

#BlogElul Day 7

 Be

A tear in a piece of cloth,

a seam undone

a loose thread pulled

until a hem is loosened

A friend who drifts away

with words unsaid

Who will sew the places

torn by overuse

or will time be allowed

to cover up the words

and seams remain split

#BlogElul Day 6

 Know

            One thing I ask of the LORD,

                     it is this that I seek—

             that I dwell in the house of the LORD

                     all the days of my life,

              to behold the LORD’s sweetness

                     and to gaze on His palace.

                             Psalm 27:4     The Book of Psalms. 

                                                          Robert Alter

I wander between the words

parsing out meanings,

finding a place to rest

If I ask this, what is asked of me

It is not the trappings—

my books stacked in bookcases

and in piles around my chair

It is not my art supplies—tubes of paints,

a few sable brushes, half finished

sketchbooks waiting for another line

It is not the words copied from books

Quotations and aphorisms 

Snippets from newspapers

nor is it my own writings

I have little to offer

My tomato plant —a small harvest

LORD feels too heavy, I shall use 

one of your other names—Ha Shem

I have no first fruits, nothing

except myself—flaws, doubts 

and at times turning my back

and walking the other way

Yet, I know I hear the words

and turn—I am here

warts and all asking

to dwell

in that same house

#BlogElul Day 5

       

    Accept

edit your life now

           liberate the past, move on

             engage reflection  

#BlogElul Day 3.

 Search

      The real road of discovery consists

      not in seeing new landscapes,

      but in having new eyes.

                  —Marcel Proust

A dark sky blots out trees 

erases clean contours

while rain waits to wash away

chalk drawings left by children

It pushes  cyclists to switch gears

in an attempt to move beyond

the sounds of thunder

A woman pushing a stroller 

looks at the sky and begins to run

I am outside waiting for the rain

I wait for the drops to wash over me

Rain nurtures my roses

and feeds small saplings 

I, too, seek to grow

#BlogElul Day 2

Act 

           

                Don’t turn your face away.

            Once you’ve seen, you can no longer act like you don’t know.

              Open your eyes to the truth. It’s all around you.

            Don’t deny what the eyes to your soul have revealed to you.

                Vashti Quiroz-Vega

bundled in blankets

sleeping on a mattress

of corrugated cardboard

wearing heavy clothes

even when the television prophet 

predicts hot steamy weather

and exhorts listeners to drink

water, stay cool

in the morning the blanket

folded into a square

packed

into a grocery cart 

and pushed down the street

to a square of concrete

a sun the size of a quarter

illuminates a handheld sign

hungry in black letters 

homeless in block print

tonight 

the blankets

stay in the cart

is it time

to act

 

#BlogElul Day 1

Prepare

I descend

beneath my outer sheath—

crawl into crevices, into niches 

hidden under sinews and roots,

and unearth spots overgrown with weeds

I need to gather them, cut away the knots,

bring them out into the open,

cut away the tendrils,

expose them to light

               

Spinning

You kissed me in the kitchen in front of the radio

before  the ice cubes flooded the basement

I listened to the preacher at the circus

describe a Helium balloon speed past my window

and photograph a  priest in a purple cassock inside out

dance with a ballerina spinning on her thumbs

Then you spun my hair into sunbeams  

A Dip in the Road

Where the road dipped it slid off the map

landing in a new snow bright light enough

to ignite trees and caress

my hair with a fresh touch 

Our car drove over a dip, my stomach 

fell into the arroyo, water shed its droplets

over and beneath each crevasse while time

swiveled until the water withdrew and I ,

initiated with a new identity

looked into a mirror 

and welcomed the advent of becoming new

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