Prayer For The Hybrid Service

 

Blessed Holy Wholeness,

We give thanks that these days,

On Shabbat,

We can meet together safely,

In person and en masse:

All three dimensional 

And smelly and real,

With actual books,

To sing and pray and learn

And kvell in the back rows.

And we give thanks that still,

On Shabbat,

We may also join in via Zoom 

For the Shabbat service: 

So that those of us who are vulnerable to Covid ,

Those of us with mobility issues,

And those of us who are far away

Can also sing and pray and learn

And kvell in the chat room. 

We give thanks for our innovative leaders

And the masks and vaccines,

And the technical consultants

That make our hybrid Shabbat possible. 

We are here, together,

And it is good. 

Yasher koach!

And let us say,

Amen

Waiting For Those First Lime Green Leaves On The Vernal Equinox

In a time of

The unfair distribution of resources 

And the violent whims of autocrats,

Of the glorification of resentment 

And a disdain for learning,

It is good to recognize 

Balance and renewal

Especially when they happen 

With no reference to us whatsoever. 

Today is the vernal equinox,

When daytime and nighttime are equal. 

Life happens 

And Spring begins. 

Blessed Holy Wholeness,

May we enjoy the growing daytime 

While waiting 

For those first lime green leaves

Of hope. 

Amen 

A Prayer For What We Do

Photo and artwork by Flash Rosenberg 

 Blessed One-ness, 

We give thanks for this Purim festival

 Of costumes and traditional noise, 

Distracting us from the bad guys 

For at least one night. 

We give thanks for the laughs 

As we give thanks for our survival. 

We could do the latter without the former 

But why would we want to? Happy Purim! 

Amen

Prayer for the Cruel Ones

What must it be like

To have had all the empathy 

Squeezed out of you,

To be so sure

Of the rightness of your cause

That you don’t care who you hurt?

What must it be like

To have had all the doubt

Pushed out of you,

To be so convinced

Of the importance of your desire

That war makes sense?

What must it be like

To have had all the love

Burnt out of you,

To be so full of hate

For the objects of your fury

That you can bomb their children?

Blessed One-ness

It must be very sad and empty

To be so terrible. 

We pray for help to remember that

So we do not 

Lose our own empathy, doubt and love

As we work for their demise.

Easier said than done. 

Amen