Getting Old

 

Getting old

Is the slow loss of shame,

Especially if you’ve spent your life

Being watched

And judged

And found wanting. 

I wasn’t fat

But I wasn’t skinny. 

So I thought I was huge. 

My entire life was organized around my big ass. 

I dressed in loose clothes,

I didn’t go swimming. 

Young men on the street 

Commented 

On the size of my ass

All the time. 

It never occurred to me 

That they liked my ass. 

It never occurred to me 

That my ass was none of their business. 

When I quit smoking 

I gained more weight. 

I’m told I was voluptuous,

I knew I was fat. 

When I hit my forties

The comments stopped. 

I could be on fire

And no man would see me. 

I missed them

For a while. 

It meant I was too old

To be sexy. 

But in my fifties

I slowly realized I was free!

If no one was looking

Then I could just be me. 

And me said,

No more dieting. 

And then me said,

If you don’t like it don’t look. 

And then me said,

No more hiding. 

And then me said,

No more apologies.  

My hair went gray

And I figured out that

If I used the right tone of voice,

Young men would do my bidding. 

I’m not a grandma. 

I’m not a mommy or an auntie. 

I don’t need them to love me. 

I need them to give me a seat on the subway.  

Except for the poverty

And the wrinkles 

And the impending decrepitude,

Getting old is lovely. 

Listen In Shul

Listen in shul 

To the siddur pages turning; 

To the children squirming; 

To feet stepping back and forward three times; 

To those checking their phones; 

To the familiar tune; 

To the memories of our dead; 

To our worries for the future; 

To the questions and the doubt: 

To our yearning for a nap; 

To the schmoozers in the back row; 

To the silent prayers; 

To us; 

To Shabbat. 

Amen 

Let’s Talk (Adonai S’fatai Tiftach )

 

“Open my lips that my mouth may declare your glory”

Or not. 

I can’t talk to Glory, and

Awesome doesn’t return my calls.  

You’re here every day,

What’s so fearsome about that?

And where’s the dialogue in terror?

You’re not a king,

You’re not even a You. 

Let’s make a hevruta, let’s talk!

Ancestors, power, holiness,

Rest, healing, gratitude, peace,

So interesting. 

I’ll start. 

Laser Fusion (for Tu Bishvat)

 

It’s Tu Bishvat, the New Year of Trees. 

Do not give up!

The forests burn but

Electric vehicles;

The seas rise but

LED lightbulbs;

Species disappear but

Solar power;

Millions starve but

Wind turbines.

We’ll be long dead but

Laser fusion!

Blessed Holy Wholeness,

    Within which lives our ingenuity and hope 

    Alongside our stupidity and despair,

May the solutions scale up and arrive in time 

To save us all from our own greed and folly, Amen. 

Happy New Year, trees! And good luck. 

Blessing for Mourning the Death of a Much Loved Animal

Art by Mike Cockrill

From the collection of Bert Salter Estate 

Blessed Holy Wholeness

Breath of the Universe 

Breathing us in

Breathing us out. 

Remembering us

Remembering our companions

Who let us love them with a full and pure heart

And who loved us back the same way. 

Amen

We were blessed to have them 

As  long as we did

And though I am really sad that they are gone,

I am really glad that they were here. 

Amen

I give thanks to the Holy Connector,

The One-ness that is eternal,

Which I experienced 

Through my sweet beasts. 

Amen

Brucha HaShleimot

Ruach ha Olam,

Breathing us in

Breathing us out.

We remember them,

We mourn their loss

And their memories are a blessing. 

And let us say, Amen

Home(s)

Light candles now,

In your home

For the homeless. 

For the displaced

With no place

They can afford;

For the first peoples

Whose lands and cultures 

Were stolen or degraded;

For the animals

Invading your backyards. 

How dare they walk where they once lived;

For those on islands

Swamped by the rising water,

Ocean where there once was land;

For those who survived a shooting,

There is no more safety,

It is lost forever;

For the addicted whose illness 

Destroys their true selves 

While the greedy make money;

For the warred upon and bombed out,

Starving and hopeless,

Not even a tent to sleep in;

For the houses and habitats

Burnt up in climate change’s fires,

And everything gone;

For the immigrants,

Losing the old lands to violence and poverty

And so violently unwelcome in the new.

Where 

Will they

Light their candles now?

This is our covenant:

Take care of the earth

And it will take care of you.

So It Is Upon Us to—

Build housing;

Make reparations;

Preserve wilderness;

End fossil fuels;

Restrict guns;

Treat addiction;

Cease fire;

Live sustainably;

Welcome immigrants. 

Create new homes

And save the old ones. 

Light candles, 

Now. 

Amen

Pairs (for Hanukkah)

God is a gerund,

A verb and a noun,

Doing and being.

Light is from God,

Both waves and particles,

Radiation and photons. 

Darkness is so full,

Many visions and none at all,

Frightening and safe. 

An event from history 

And the stories of rabbis,

The eight days exist and also evolve. 

Hanukkah is dialectics, between 

Revolution and accommodation,

Identity and assimilation. 

Solstice or Hanukkah?

Let’s not worry about 

Somebody else’s paradigm.

Light and dark are a gerund,

Seeing and not seeing.

Amen v’Amen. 

The Talking Donkey

A man

Named Bilam,

A people-pleaser, and

A freelance speaker of 

Curses and blessings,

Had a donkey

That he rode 

To his professional engagements.  

 

One day Bilam was hired

By a fearful king,

Balak,

To professionally curse

A passing people

Whom the king felt threatened by

(To be fair, there were a lot of them).

On Bilam’s way to the gig,

Riding his donkey,

An angel appeared.

Wielding a big sword

And much opposition 

To the cursing job at hand,

And very prepared to kill Bilam 

To prevent this outcome. 

Bilam could not see the angel

But the donkey could

So she refused to go forward.  

Twice Bilam beat the donkey to force her forward

And twice she refused. 

Frustrated and hurt and bored by the abuse

The donkey finally spoke up. 

“I can’t go on,“ said the donkey.

 “I see an angel with a sword in the path ahead.“

Bilam beat the donkey some more.

“You can hit me all you want,” the donkey said,

“But I see what I see. 

When have I ever lied to you before?”

Bilam had to admit that this was so,

Whereupon he was able to see the angel 

And have a conversation.  

The story goes on, 

That even though Bilam tries to curse the passing horde

He finds himself only able to praise them,

Much to Balak’s chagrin,

And the story ends with Bilam’s beautiful blessing,

“How good are your tents, O Jacob…”

Nothing more is heard from the donkey.

Poor beast.

When you are a talking donkey, 

You see stuff.

and when you see stuff 

You say stuff. 

It’s not always welcome, 

and you get yelled at, 

A lot

Because often you don’t say truth in a way 

That people can or want to

Understand.

But if an angel with a sword is standing in the path, 

And if you are a talking donkey,

You stop 

And try to make your point. 

And if you’re with that beast

It might behoove you to listen

No matter how annoying she may be.   

 

Life as a talking donkey can be hard:

You are often not particularly beloved. 

No one chooses you for their team on the playground. 

People-pleasers may hit you

And sometimes angels slay you

But mostly everyone ignores you. 

But if you see stuff

You gotta say stuff.  

It is in your nature,

You talk. 

 

There are times, 

When grief and fear have taken over. 

When everyone is Balak

And all they can see are threatening hordes. 

It may be that we are in one of those times.

And it is upon all the donkeys to speak up

To remind us of what,

In our panic, 

We cannot see. 

 

The donkey sometimes sees the perpetrators

And the hate for what it often is:

Fear.   

And they are right to be afraid:

Change is hard, 

Just ask Balak.  

 

But the donkey sometimes also sees the activists 

And their despair for what it is:

Compassion.  

And they are right to feel others’ pain and joy.

Prophecy is hard,

Just ask Bilam. 

 

And sometimes the donkey also sees the survivors

And their persistence and stubbornness for what they are:

Hope.

And they are right to look towards the future but

Imagining happy endings is hard,

Just ask those passing hordes.

 

So,

In conclusion:

You can’t hide from talking donkeys:

They never shut up.  

And the next time you meet a talking donkey, 

She might say something true

That ends in a beautiful blessing

Or she might not.

Either way,

Please 

Do not hit her,

Poor beast.

 

Amen.

Prayer for Those Avoiding The News

 

Turn off the screens,

I don’t want to look. 

I’m scared

Disgusted 

Devastated 

Angry. 

And I know

I’m not doing enough to help

Or worse

Not doing anything at all. 

I’m made helpless by events

That feel too big to be shaped by me. 

I will eat a pint of ice cream 

And hope that this is temporary but

Today 

I can’t bear to look. 

Help me look. 

Amen