Sunrise


    Signs of Sunrise

    Sun glow on the horizon,
    clouds like red coals just above,
    creatures who scurry or gather
    on the surface of earth.


    Morning Blessings

    Why is it,
    upon waking in the morning,
    that three dashes of water
    on the face from
    the nearby brook and
    with a stretch of one hand to the sky,
    the other hand is content
    to touch the knee,
    the belly is happy
    at a campfire
    to have one egg, half
    a potato, some coffee—
    in short, the pit of you just wants to be
    king of the hill in view,
    out of reach
    on the horizon
    under the golden sun.
    Why is it?


    The Power and the Gift

    The power of providential care
    suffuses all of nature.
    Take it;
    take care.
    The whole of all worlds
    is a gift of love.
    Give it;
    give love.


    Young Abraham's Ancient Plea

    In a village courtyard
    my dog and I met
    the statue of a shepherd.
    My dog moved around, moved
    and licked the marble staff
    of that marble shepherd.
    The eyes of the shepherd looked at me
    as if to say:
    "Your dog moves; you can move,
    but I cannot!"
    From the hills beyond I heard the echo
    of an old plea:
    "Aren't you far less constrained
    than a statue?"


    The Visitors

    There once were two men:
    one of certitude,
    one of incertitude.
    The former thought that certitude was positive;
    the latter thought that incertitude was negative.
    Yet they both were such close friends
    that others thought
    they could read each other's minds.
    Fancy that they were two of the three
    who visited Abraham when he was recovering
    at age ninety-nine in Mamre.
    This helps to explain what is needed
    when visiting one who is recovering.


    The Six Cries of Sarah

    Upon hearing that Abraham, his sacrificial knife, and Isaac were missing:
    "Oh Lord G-d, what have you done?
    Abraham, isn't Isaac my son also?
    Isaac, son!
    Oh Lord G-d, take me in place of Isaac
    Oh Abraham, Isaac, I love you both.
    Oh Lord G-d, provide!"


    The Old Lady

    sits alone at the table
    with a teaspoon stirring a single ice cube
    in a glass of hot tea.
    She thrusts and parries
    as the cube turns and dwindles.
    She stares at the glass of warm tea.
    As her wont of late
    when sitting, she falls asleep.
    Under the bare bulb the light
    shines off her hair that is white
    like a blank sheet of paper.
    The sheet of piano music
    that she had been rereading
    flutters quietly
    from her lap
    to the brown tile floor.
    The piece is in the key of F.
    The last chord is F9.
    The last nine words of the song are
    "a simple ice cube in a glass of tea."
    Because the high G of the last chord
    reminds her of a grace note uncompleted
    her sleep is in a state of suspension.
    Her dream is of a smiling shadow from his missing face,
    the face of her dear husband of long ago.
    She wakes with a small start and
    takes a sip of warm tea.


    Choose Life

    Life is so precious,
    if I were in agony
    near the end of my climb,
    I would hang on
    by my fingertips.
    S. Paul Epstein (1896–1986)


    From the Song of Moses
    (Including Pogroms and Holocausts
    up to the Twenty-First Century)


    The Rock, his work is perfect,
    for all his ways are justice,
    a G-d of faithfulness and without iniquity,
    just and right is he.
    As an eagle that stirreth up her nest
    hovers over her young,
    spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them,
    beareth them on her pinions,
    so the Lord alone did lead,
    but He saw that Jeshurun and man forsook the Rock,
    and He said:
    "I will leave my Shechinah but will withdraw my face from them;
    I will see what their end shall be."
    The Rock, just and right is he.


    Near the Ending of the Song of Moses

    See now that I, even I, am G-d and there is no g-d beside me.
    Alone I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal, and there is none
    who can deliver out of my hand.
    Oh, for
    only an infinitesimal fraction of
    his knowledge,
    to better understand but
    an infinitesimal fraction of
    his power
    as he rules
    according to his rules,
    of which
    he alone
    is author.


    Yesterday

    A Jew and an African
    slaved side by side
    on a pyramid under the harsh Egyptian sun.

    Today
    we work in England and in America,
    in Israel and in Ethiopia,
    on skyscrapers and
    on tomes under lamps.
    We work and struggle for
    the master of goals
    within each of us.
    Lord of mercy,
    may one who was once
    cruelly a slave
    ever return to wholeness?


    The Two Cries of Job

    "Hands, where are you?"
    "G-d, where are you?"
    But Job had three friends
    and no mortal counselors
    except himself and
    all of humanity
    in the course of each day.


    Looking for Three Others

    Like a man on a pogo stick
    the four-faced living creature on one wheel
    is looking for three others of his kind
    in search
    of his destiny.


    Another Experiment Was

    that poem
    of long ago.
    This poem
    is about the tomorrow
    that somehow slips into the now—
    on Arizona land
    under a dreamy blue sky
    between a sunrise and sunset, over the lovely red soil
    fed by early mist and dew.
    In the late long shadow of a big red rock
    I stand and wait.
    How beautiful is the now
    and the persisting spirit,
    the tomorrow
    and the promising spirit.
    It is the spirit that is close,
    the tomorrow that is somehow distant.
    So this poem must wonder
    until passion leads into love leads to
    peace leads to serenity resolves into passion
    leads into love leads to peace, and so forth
    until at last
    attentiveness to such circles of thought go abed,
    and joie de vivre abed
    followed by slumber abed,
    leading to wakefulness
    in the tomorrow that is already
    the new now.


    Unmistakable

    There is the clever wolf
    in the shepherd's clothes
    who talks
    and walks
    as if he were the real thing.
    Why does the real shepherd allow this?

    Is it that important
    for sheep of the flock
    to learn who has fangs and claws and
    who has the heart and arm
    for the one and only staff?

    The shepherd's dog knows the wolf;
    the shepherd's dog knows the shepherd.
    For a dog or a sheep
    the touch
    of the real shepherd's gentle hand
    at the right moment is
    unmistakable.


    The Parting Words

    of Satan to Jesus:
    "I can wait."
    But we understand
    that Satan is only a clever wolf.
    Yet we also know
    that perseverance and ultimate patience
    reside majestically with
    Hashem,
    none else.


    Superstition

    is a devious foe,
    but he is only a pebble
    next to the Rock.
    His allies are prejudice, lack of education,
    rampant knowledge, and
    (near the end of a long list)
    rampant pride and
    lack of love.
    As for the tallest rock,
    where else would willows seeking tallness
    want to stand?
    The willows bend and sway in the wind
    yet continue to reach into the sky
    for the sun and the stars.


    A Willow on Hoshano Rabboh

    The good man with just a little school learning
    is a willow beating the ground
    who causes the Earth to react
    only imperceptibly
    but himself reacts to the beat perceptibly.
    Possibly the learned man
    understands the
    heaviness
    of earth.
    It is simply an issue of wonder
    at the world in which we live.


    Oops

    An extra wink of sleep
    is a missed step on the road of
    understanding, compassion, insight, laughter,
    and pauses, precious pauses,
    with our one and only genial and eternal Friend


    Waiting in Court for Judgment

    I stood in court before
    the genial old judge
    as I pled my case.
    The judge smiled.
    I turned around and saw
    the prosecutor smiling at me.
    There was not a titter from
    the whole court behind.
    I knew my case was lost.
    With that genial old judge there was
    no shout,
    not even a hint of
    a whisper. Then
    that kind old gentle judge
    spoke to me for the first time
    in my own voice,
    and I realized for the first time
    that the old judge was
    something of a ventriloquist.


    The Marine

    There once was a lean and mean marine
    as apt to kill
    as to maim or hurt.
    He was as ready to kill
    as to be killed.
    Today it's not that he is crazy,
    just that he has been there
    and been through a lot.
    How is it that fifty years from now
    he will be the mildest
    and gentlest of men?
    Will it be due to the
    dear woman whom he will marry?
    Is it important to whom he gives credit?
    Perhaps simple answers are important.


    Unfinished Lesson

    While standing one day of mid-May in a Tokyo dojo,
    the agile old warrior
    touched me with one finger,
    lightly pushed at a place on my upper body
    and almost floored me,
    discovering fighting-stance imbalances within my body
    there since youth ...


    Depression for Me

    is doubt
    about what you know for sure,

    is feeling bad
    about what you have done gladly,

    is trading the Rock
    upon which you stand
    for quicksand.


    The Plea

    Please, holy sovereign,
    do not withdraw the
    eternal light from your lighthouse.
    The sound of this light,
    the light from this sound,
    is too awesome for each of us.
    We cannot understand what we see,
    what we hear.
    Forgive us,
    each one of us.
    We are only mortal men,
    mortal women,
    afloat in a lull
    at the center of raging waters.


    A Botanist or Entomologist Speaks

    Plants and ants
    are the terrestrials
    of our planet.
    As for humans,
    we all can be
    too cruel
    for words.
    Yet we suffer and complain;
    the plants and ants are silent.


    Our First Principle

    Behind our universe
    and mind
    are math
    and G-d.
    We assume
    what we need to assume;
    it is our principles
    for which we are willing to die.
    There is much that we do not know,
    but we do know that each of us
    has a precious sense of self-decency:
    reason to respect the self-decency of others.


    Micro Pendulum
    (for Berel Greenberg and John Mattson)


    There is a micro pendulum within each of us
    that swings between humility and vanity.
    As for vanity,
    it comes and goes,
    but for some of us,
    it comes and stays
    like a fester.
    A man can be vain
    about the greatness of his humility
    or even the greatness of his fester.
    As for humility,
    it comes and goes,
    but for some of us,
    it comes and stays
    like a mission beginning to rust.
    The words of humbleness are easy.

    The clothes of humbleness are easier to choose,
    but it is the man beneath
    and his intentions
    that determine whether the humility
    and its mission are true.
    (Man or woman,
    his or her,
    the risk of staying instead of going is the same
    and constant with every breath we take.)
    So there is some worth
    in the micro pendulum
    in transit.


    How Much Do I Love You?

    More than the light and courage
    I receive from the stars,
    more than the warmth I receive from the meadow
    on a mellow summer's day,
    more than the beauty of
    your body and smile,
    more, much more, than all these
    keys and tokens.