9 yellow Jewish celebration cards

(The Price of Freedom)- The Honey and the Sting Bound Together

The Honey and the Sting Bound Together in the Carcass of the Lion…We camp out in the

wadi, laying our sleeping bags out on the sand of the dry riverbed. When my bleeding

starts, I strip off my clothes, bathing my limbs in the moonlight. Tonight, under sister

moon’s influence I will not plug the blood. I squat calm, watching the blood flow into the

ground. But it makes him ask anxious questions…like a little boy who’s never seen blood

before.

Aren’t you bleeding too much? He asks.

His questions scare him, diminish his power.

Calm in the moonlight, with sister moon’s glowing eyes, I see in him Samson’s heir, with

all of his powers and blindness’.

Looking at him thus I can feel his long hair brushing my inner thighs. And I know myself,

my allure, my womanly scent that causes him to fall at my feet, blood or no blood,

wanting relations with me. Sister moon’s eyes hold the image of what he will do

in remembrance of me or in grief.

The Log be

Omer Fires

Leap…

The Log be Omer Fires Leap…just like the children…in hurrying, noisy clamor…after the

last un-salvaged board from…the new construction site.

In merry conflagration…they light

up the neighborhoods… the skies-like thousands of sparking stars.

They light up the hills… passing the messages of the fires… as each potato wrapped in

shiny foil… is tucked in… glowing embers.

Scout and pioneer songs are sung-...long past any child’s bedtime-as multiple

generations hurl sticks onto the flames, holding each other in close armed encirclement-

lit from within, by the light…flowing up the long tee-peed skirt,

of the curling, hurling, thousands of glowing lips of celebration…….

Migdal The city of Refuge/Tower of Strength Photo poem card

The Eve before the Eve

of Pessach-

I love to wander through the streets and alleys of Jerusalem.

-

.

I make the rounds to all the restaurants…to the humble falafel stand…on the corner of

Ben Yehuda and Hillel Street-to the grand façade and glitter of…Kinoor David (David’s

Violin)

What makes this night different from …any other night?

Tonight, humble or grand-close to midnight, and for long hours afterwards-the

restaurant owners and chefs, have emptied out their pantries, laying or tumbling their

huge copper pans and pots out onto the streets-laying them out onto the cobbled streets

each and every one engaged in an immense labor-scouring the huge pots and pans, and

cauldrons-with scalding, steaming water-bending their backs to nights-the stiff wire brushes

that they’re using, to polish the gleaming

pots into-an even more gleaming order (Seder)Tonight-Jerusalem- not Jerusalem of Gold; but

gleaming down long streets, down hidden- their work of cleansing the cookware for the

coming-seven days, and seven winding alleys and cul-de-sacs…the shine and early morning

song of a- Jerusalem of brass and copper, shining:

Migdal a City of Refuge/Tower of Strength Photo poem card

Feast of Freedom

Feast of Freedom

The line between the promised and the boundary…

of the new ways of our love story, has been written in blood;

drawn up into the flight feathers, of one of our hawks,

not the dove…sent out by Jonah.

That was a different promise that the dove was looking for signs and

completion of...a different promised land.

And

if the result of my loving you,

of my touching your life, changing it,

causes the blossoming-opening of a blood red poppy,

or even the rearing up of the blood red head of

a Maccabee bringing its message now of the flight or fight …for

freedom……so be it.

Migdal a city of Refuge/Tower of Strength PhotoPoem card

Passover

Feast of the Un-pursued

You know how much I love you.

It was me (personally)

who painted on an arc of blood over your door,

so that you would be spared the death of the first born.

On this night… The Angel of Death…

will brush your door with her wings in passing…

.but my love, will keep you safe……will lead you out the door, and will set you on your

way, onto the path that you must go…

Take a few deep breaths, and feel me around you, as you drink

the various glasses of wine tonight.

Take deep breathes and feel me touching you…on the shoulder…

… on the forehead.

I am making invisible reminder markings, there in reminder that you were born to

lead…and not to follow.

Whether the markings…are in blood,

or tears, or kisses … …matters not

Migdal a city of Refuge/Tower

of Strength PhotoPoem

card

Bruised Time…

Your mouth descends

covering mine with an

intensity

tasting, working

releasing into the air

(the fair)

the good scent of

thyme the trodden

upon scent of time…

kissed thoroughly by a bee sting…released into the air

(the fair, the yareed)…the good scent of time..

.provided, loved by, and molded to heel to…kissed by a rough and silken man (you)

smiling with his mouth (you) afraid with his eyes (you)unmasked in his need

(you) releasing into the air (the fair) the good scent of thyme

the trodden upon scent of time…as I propose marriage (now)

(now) wrapping you up in my tallit.

I ate you yesterday. I’m eating you when I’m born. I ate you when I died…...a lunch

sandwich, wrapped up in a pita and…the fair taste, the good taste of thyme (time)

Migdal a city of Refuge

/Tower of Strength Photo Poem card

An Identifying Acrostic

.A globed journey through dimensions of time and place

.was to be the measured fate of my search of self

.and it was not to be easy; whether in contemplated rush out of harms way or

.nun’s ignorance of grand papa’s circumcising hidden Torah treasure

.deemed worthy to be kept safe at all costs-as it was Ben Maimon’s own

.ever comforting from the secret hidden behind sweet Rachel’s bosom

.racked by torture and rapture each in turn, but saved, safe..

.invested with the knowledge handed down from her forefather’s exiled heart

.never losing sight of the eternal light beaming down upon my countenance

.grounded and turned to the East, toward Jerusalem

.Jewel among all gems is my belief and my need

.ever lifting my sights and goals, deeper and higher

.wasted not in an ember’s glowing soul

A Golden String from David’s HarpPhotoPoem

The Desperate Sounding of the Shofar

The Desperate Sounding of the Shofar The world ready…perhaps not The world readies…perhaps not for the blasting call, the blasting vibrato of the ram’s horn, rending the air, and our souls, through the dense pride and rifting ebony of our insolence and insouciance, our whistling in the face of the deliberate and intended cruelty, done to the small and weak one, during the furnace-d, tempering, course of the passing year, now ending

With a call, in echoing call from mountain top to mountain top, of sentinel’s blowing, the shofar, in a long and unbroken call; high pitched ending wail, beseeching us to turn, to repent of the carelessness, the callousness, of that one mean spirited moment, when the inner shofar, the inner sense of kindness, remained silent; cleft and mute, The shofar, now in desperate moan, in high pitched ending wail, uncurls it’s long and curled horn length; calls and calls, straight into our hearts- with short deep thrusts We must make amends before the next ten days have ended…. The desperate shofar calls in anguished blast; cries like Saul; heartbroken in blast after blast; fierce and righteous in the last hours before the end. The shofar sobs……………………“Seal us in the Book of Life (sobs)” The shofar sobs…………… “Sign unto us another day, another year (sobs)” The shofar sobs………… “Oh King of Kings, we are on our faces (sobs)” The shofar sobs…………“ In need are we …of turning (sobs)” In need we are of turning ...and in short, curt, blasting echoes, the day turns, the night turns …the leaf turns, the boat turns (over)..edges turn and show open hands, flat open faces. endings turn into beginnings…beginnings turn again on themselves…the season turns, the year turns...the wheel turns, the world turns…the man turns, the woman turns…the child turns…and God returns

From Within the Gates of the Holy City card

From Within the Gates …

So, let’s say that I am loving you

from within the gates of the Holy City. Oh, I love you

in other places, too. I always love you in other places…

from within prisms and pyramids of light and clouds.

of places that do not have a rainy season, and mists of deserts; the crystal green of deep caverns.

But to go back to the gates, where

I am an acrobat of love, a wire walker, walking, dancing

on a thin golden wire, stretched between the Old City

and the new, wearing the flowing white robes of lightness and joy…as I remember you…need

you, as I am stretched like another golden wire, muscles pulled taut with the balance required in

the grace of the dance required to get across the wire, and into your arms.