Our Tallis Trees

 

Our home shul in Brooklyn meets in a church.

We don’t have a yard or a roof or air conditioning 

So for many years during the summer we have met in Prospect Park

Under two large trees that overlook the ball fields. 

There used to be three trees but one fell down after Hurricane Sandy. 

 

These two big trees have trunks that have become our bimah. 

We place our camp chairs and blankets around them 

And we are shaded by their joined canopies

Which we have come to feel is like

Being covered by a giant green tallis. 

The many leaves are the fringes and

Everything inside is kodosh, holy, 

In Shabbat time and space,

And everything outside is khol, mundane, 

Prospect Park on a Saturday morning. 

Inside are study, prayers, songs, meditations, poems, potluck, community and words of Torah. 

Outside are ball games, the Dog Pond, bicycles and the guy who sells ice cream from a cart between the 9th Street entrance and the Long Meadow. 

It would be perfect if only there was a bathroom. 

 

That summer before Covid we planted a sapling in place of the lost third tree

In honor of our beloved retiring founding rabbi,

Bless her. 

That same day we acknowledged our summer Beit Knesset

When our Hazzan surreptitiously placed a wooden mezuzah in the crook of the biggest of the two trees. 

We sang and said a blessing. 

We didn’t have permission from the Park for this

But our cantor did check with an arborist who said it wouldn’t hurt the tree. 

This small outlaw act made us giggle and kvell and cry

For our founding rabbi

For the future

For our clever hidden mezuzah 

And for our sheltering Tallis Trees. 

 

Many of us liked to visit this sacred space when it wasn’t Shabbat 

To touch the mezuzah and say a private prayer. 

But last year the mezuzah disappeared. 

Our Hazzan asked a Park guy about it

(He knew her, because of the tree we planted).

He said he’d seen it almost immediately and decided to ignore it,

Bless him,

But that one day it had disappeared. 

What happened to the mezuzah?

Was it brought low by a bad storm?

Did a bird make a nest with it?

Was it taken down by a passing Jew with a strict interpretation of where a mezuzah should be?

Maybe it fell into the earth below

And our holy words were broken down into their smallest component parts,

Becoming Holy Mulch,

Feeding the Tallis Tree. 

 

HaShleimut, Blessed Totality,

We give thanks to the Tallis Trees 

For their shelter and their beauty.

We give thanks for having this special outside sanctuary 

During the years of Covid.

We give thanks to the deep rest

That comes when we are in Shabbat with nature. 

We give thanks to the staff of Prospect Park 

For their vigilant maintenance of the green spaces. 

And we ask for the clarity, endurance and skills needed

To keep our trees safe and flourishing. 

 

Because all trees are Tallis Trees. 

Bless them. 

Amen