Friday, April 7, 2023

What I Do Now

 




Art by Carolyn Hall


I didn’t find what I do now

(not remunerative but very satisfying) 

Until my fifties. 


But first I lost interest 

In everything I was doing 

Beforehand. 


Or it lost interest in me.  

I mourned, 

I got bored. 


Then I was surprised 

By the new thing. 

I wish for you that surprise.




Monday, April 3, 2023

Telling The Story


Telling the story
By describing the tellers
But never the hero,
By praising the outcome
But ignoring the plot
Is weird.

So let’s tell the story. 

We were slaves. 
Pharaoh ordered the boy babies killed,
Shifra and Puah saved them. 
Miriam put her brother in a basket on the Nile,
A princess saved him. 
J0chabed his mother nursed him,
The Princess raised him. 
Pharaoh was pharaoh,
The slaves suffered. 
Moses killed an oppressor
And ran. 
He married Zipporah,
He shepherded sheep,
A bush didn’t burn,
It said
I am that I am,
Save the people. 
Our hero went back,
Aaron worked the communications,
God inspired,
Moses organized. 
Plagues. 
Innocents died
But not us. 
Pharaoh said yes then no then yes,
We left. 
Yay!
Nachshon stepped in the sea,
Everyone stepped into the sea,
Pharaoh drowned
And rhe Hebrews were free. 
On the other side of the water
Miriam and the women danced,
Aaron prayed,
Everyone kvetched. 
God fed them in the desert. 
Moses went up the mountain and
Everybody freaked out .
Torah was acquired.
Moses talked with God,
Bezazel created beauty.
A cloud led them through the desert.
Jethro advised them,
Korech agitated them, 
Joshua fought for them and
They walked for forty years
Until
Most everybody died.
But
Their children got to the Promised Land
Which is a whole other story.  

And because we were slaves,
We don’t enslave.
Because we were oppressed, 
We mustn’t oppress. 
Because we fought for freedom,
We are allies. 
Because when you know the story,
You know.