Today I sat outside above the empty street of quiet Sabbath
and watched the birds
dance lazily to the gentle breeze
and felt my back tickled by the same cool wind which guides their wings in endless circumnavigation of the same four blocks
over and over
I saw the rich tapestry of my neighbor’s hanging gardens
the fuchsia the gold the paisley pink the endless green and tender care
the water drawn from wells across the courtyard and fed maternally to unfurling roots in soil from a field outside the gates
I watched the towers shine, white limestone announcing to the skyline the efforts of a thousand hands and a single crane,
brought to life in hunger and mantras repeated three times daily
“we will come home we will come home
we will come home”
Beyond the towers – rolling hills, obscured slightly by a haze of almost-cloud
clinging to itself in the space held between earth and heaven,
echoing songs and guiding the eye through terraced valleys garbed
with olive trees and wizened grass, waiting to be nibbled at by dusty sheep
watched out of the corner of the eye of a yawning teenager
shaken out of bed for the nth time to take up the same crook as his fathers and grandfathers and great-grandfathers and David and Moses and Abel and Adam
And all around me was
the song of the birds the colours of flowers
the taste of the wind the smell of the sky the silence of cars the murmur of couples the heat of the words of the sages and prophets
the tearing of kri’yah the mending of hearts
the calling to arms the making of peace the laughter of homes the praises of G-d and it was so damn beautiful that I couldn’t close
my eyes for fear of the dark in a moment lost
Today I felt on my brow the same sun
that stood still above the
battlefield of Joshua
and smiled and drank my coffee and, with all our concern, felt better about
the world and the life I live and what it means to think so hard you hurt yourself
