AT THE WELL
Which are the clouds
of Holiness and which
the fog of our own
making –
Shma – listen, receive
what has been broken,
longs to return, open
the dark cramped places, let
walls crumble, let pain lift,
all the tired, overused burdens.
I clear a space for praise, placing three stones, loosened from well worn shoes,
beside essence of sage, still green slivers of thyme, and lavender – the scent
wanders towards my drying skin and spine, filling in the cracks. I place
There she sat in her void
life and word still a dark whole
and she said: let there be
self, and there was
pink flailing breathing –
reaching to find the familiar edges
of what had been womb.
I hear him calling
from my closed tent –
gather assemble
come to the fire.
Let’s try again
to retrieve the trust
shattered with the first tablets
Bo come into the captive
mind of Pharaoh, hardened,
stiffened. made resistent:
va’yichazak, va yi’cabad, va yi’kashe
we stand again
at the foot of the mountain of God
and everything is speaking to us
terror and beauty,
in language that is beyond
the knowable