Maybe: For Sukkot

 

“Oh let me behold your presence!”

Exodus 33:18

Maybe when you sit in the sukkah, 

And you look around at the flimsy walls 

That maybe you built yourself, 

Maybe you can imagine 

That they are there to remind you 

Of the need for humans to construct descriptions 

and meaning, 

Golden calves and theologies, 

To help them make it through their lives, 

Which is okay, maybe.  

Maybe, as you sit in the sukkah 

Within these tangible constructs, 

You look up 

And you can see through to the stars 

And you can’t help but be reminded 

Of how vast and incomprehensible this universe is

And how amusing are our explanations. 

And maybe this will scare you

Because it cannot be grasped. 

But maybe it doesn’t need to be understood 

Especially because  it never will be

Or because the answer is obvious 

Like death and creation.  

And maybe that’s what all the atonement 

And redemption was about last week. 

So maybe if you sit for a while

Surrounded by immense mystery 

It gets easier to forgive the forgivable 

And enjoy your day. 

Maybe, 

When you sit in this hut, 

Contemplating the universe 

Whilst eating a snack,

Safe within the see-through sukkah walls yet

Under the stars of the awesome whatever, 

You will let yourself imagine that

God is never begun, never over, always now.  

Maybe. 

And may it be that this God-ness passes over you. 

Amen

On The Birth Of Babies (And Grandbabies)

The future screams in our arms!

Maybe they know what’s coming for them,

I hope not.

For now they are pure joy,

Newness incarnate

Mindful without effort.

We laugh as they discover everything,

Literally everything:

Toes, poop, sugar, grief…

Blessed Holy Wholeness,

We welcome this child into the One-ness!

May they save the world 

And have lots of fun. 

Amen

(Written for Otto Rose, born August 23, 2021)

Aleinu for Yom Kippur

Bend the knee and leave the old damage behind. 

It is resolved

Or it is not.

It is forgiven

Or it is not. 

In any case

Those gates are shut. 

Walk into this next year

And acknowledge the new suffering.

The Earth begs for a rest

And it is up to us to help,

This is our covenant. 

And it’s not enough to live small,

This year we must act big. 

Aleinu.

Underneath (For Selichot)

 

Blessed Holy Wholeness,

During the month of Elul we ponder and remember,

An illusion of thoughtfulness,

Because underneath the meek apologies lie

Obsession

Resentment 

And embarrassments that do 

Whatever it is that

Hate

Lies 

And ignorance do 

To help us create the past. 

When the field lies fallow, there is

Only an illusion of rest,

Because underneath the lumpy dirt lie

Microbes 

And worms

And burrowing creatures that do

Whatever it is that

Tefillah 

Tzedukah 

And Teshuvah do

To help us create the future.  

We’re sorry, blessed One-ness, 

But

On Selichot,

After this time of fear and wild hope,

We may not be able to

Find room in our hearts 

For the haters and the liars and the idiots. 

But

On Erev Rosh Hashanah,

In honor of the coming year,

We might still find

There is room in our hearts

For microbes and worms and maybe a gopher or two. 

Amen

(Drawing ©  Mike Cockrill)

A Blessing For Buster on Rosh Hodesh Elul

This is a blessing for my old orange cat, Buster,

On the occasion of Rosh Hodesh Elul, 

Rosh Hashanah La Beheimot,

The New Year of the Domesticated Beasts.

  

Buster was an athlete in his youth. 

He’s named for Buster Keaton because

He was always leaping and levitating

And doing triple axels on the ceiling

And he never smiled.

 

Buster was also kind of a jerk. 

Standoffish and emotionally withholding,

He ruined two sets of venetian blinds and

Every screen in every window.

He broke all my small breakables

And

Sometimes I would catch him

Staring at his brother,

Sweet fuzzy cuddly Sammy,

With this look in his eyes

That said,

“I have no choice, I must bite Sammy on his ass.”

And then he would.

Intervention only delayed the inevitable.

 

Have you heard of family systems theory?

When Sammy died, Buster took his place:

He got cuddly and loving and slept on my face.

 

And now Buster is very old, 

He’s 22!

He misses the litter box more often than not.

He howls very loudly when he’s hungry

And howls very loudly after he has eaten.

He falls over when he sneezes!

Sometimes Buster walks down the hallway and then stops halfway

And you can see him thinking,

What was I doing?

Sometimes he remembers and continues on,

Sometimes he doesn’t and goes back to bed.

Man, I can so so so relate to this.

 

Buster is an inside apartment cat, 

My captive all his life.

He never got to serenade the neighborhood,

He never got to have sex,

He never got to fight for territory,

He never got to crouch in the tall grass stalking his prey.

Buster only murdered three mice, that I know of,

When the neighbors moved,

And it’s a shame because he was born to kill.

How do I dare to offer him a blessing 

When I have been at best a benevolent tyrant

Thwarting his every natural desire?

 

For fifteen months during COVID

Buster was the only living being

I could touch.  

Bless you, Buster. 

I love you. 

I’m sorry. 

Thank you, 

My old domesticated beast.

Please don’t die and

Happy New Year.

Amen. 

The Story of Shabbat

 Every Shabbat

We wake up and bless, 

Loving the return to our physical bodies.

Then we sing together in praise,

 Loving our community. 

Then we contemplate God and glory,

Loving our covenant  with wholeness. 

Then we stand and pray,

Loving our divine one-on-One. 

Then we read our holy books,

Loving our histories and our stories. 

Then we bend our knees,

Loving our commitments to justice and righteousness.

Then we daven the Kaddish,

Loving the memories of the dead. 

Then we drink wine,

Go home

And, if we’re lucky,

Have lots of good sex

With someone we love

And then 

A nice Shabbat nap. 

Shabbat Shalom,

Amen

KRIA 2021

 

When my mother died,

I was 3000 miles away

On a teen study trip in England. 

I’d said goodbye to her at the airport and never saw her again. 

They woke me up in the dorm

And told me my mother was sick and I had to go home to New York. 

Part of me knew that this meant she was dead

But as my friends gathered to say goodbye

I complained, to their horror, 

about my mother’s hypochondria and 

how she always was interrupting 

whenever I was having fun. 

The only book I had with me on the plane home was

The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus,

and this was kind of funny even then. 

I mean, really?

My father told me she was dead as I walked in the door and

All I could think about was what I had left behind:

My first boyfriend,

Nigel, 

Who had eyes like a young Martin Landau. 

The house was filled with relatives and people from the Temple. 

I made jokes and refused to cry. 

My mother was 48. 

I was 16. 

When my father announced he was sick

I was 3000 miles away living in the Pacific Northwest. 

It took about a year for him to die. 

I came East for a visit,

We talked about everything except his coming death

Or that I loved him.

I said a normal goodbye as I got into a cab to the airport to go back to Seattle. 

He looked very sad

And I never saw him again. 

I had been planning to move back home in a few months

In time for his last days

But he died in an emergency room a few weeks later. 

I returned for the funeral and cried during the service

And cried at the cemetery 

And I cried when, for the first time in 12 years, I saw my mother’s headstone. 

My father was 61. 

I was 28. 

I remember the sound of the black ribbon 

Ripped apart in shock and grief, each time

By the rabbi

When I think of all the families who watched

As their parents went into the hospital with COVID 

And who never saw them again. 

Yahrzeit 2021

Glorious and holy are the possibilities of God. 

We’re getting used to the losses

But that’s not the same

As being okay.   



Things are different now.  

We want to go back to normal 

But normal is gone. 

Many died,

We sat shiva  

And now it’s time for yahrzeit. 

So pour a shot of whiskey 

For each member of the minyan. 

L’chaim!

And let us say, amen. 

It’s almost simple:

Democracy is threatened,

The planet is in danger. 

Mourning must end,

We can’t stay in grief

We must act now. 

We are afraid that

There is not enough goodness,

There is not enough hope. 

Blessed One-ness. 

Now is the time for teshuvah, 

returning 

to our true and brave selves.

Now is the time for  tefillah,

imagining 

the future through holy conversations.

Now is the time for tzedukah, 

fighting 

for the survival of all our communities.

Holy Wholeness,

For all the living and in memory of the dead,

For all the possibilities of God,

Let us say Amen