Sacrilege

A flowering tree
And, there, windblown, among the blossoms,
Snagged,
A plastic shopping bag
A tag
of desecration
against the G-d of all creation.
Must this be?

(Link>) Chartreuse

Bright green leaves a-way up high
shout "Joy!" against the sunny sky

"Halleluhu . . . etz pri v'chol arazim"*
Days like this are like a waking dream
Praise the Maker ba-m'romim


*Psalm 148: "Praise Him . . . fruit trees and all cedars . . . "

ba-m'romim--in the exalted heights


This is the first poem written on the subway in the new notebook. I need one with a spiral-bound top, though--I need to be able to flip the pages easily.

This evening's view from the elevated subway train

Fluffy coral clouds float in a pale blue sky
In just about half an hour, the sun will say goodby

('Tis long gone, but it took me a while to get home
and post this miniature tome :) )


Man, I gotta start carryin' a notebook--this is something like the fourth poem I've written in my head on the subway since roughly February (and the third one today). The original draft of that February one is still on the only scrap of paper I could find in my backpack at the time.

Too much information :)

This changeable weather is so annoying
It really gets my goat
I was so overdressed on the way home from work
That my sweat could have floated a boat

Okay, go ahead and fire away
Even I would have to say
Such foolishness probably takes the prize
as the single most tasteless post of the day
But I couldn't resist hitting "Publish" anyway :)

Just let this blogger
have an occasional guilty pleasure
And I promise that my next poem will be better

See above--
the next one's dainty as a dove.

"Baby greens"

Tiny bright green leaves on bushes--
Baby leaves on baby trees
Designed by the Divine to please



(Or:
Designed min d’Oraita to please

Min d'Oraita--from heaven

Pick one. "Divine" just works better in the poem.)

Correction: Bob commented "oraita = "Torah". Oh well, it was a good try.

Looks like "the Divine"
will just have to be fine. :)

Azaleas in the pouring rain

Make a colorful refrain
Abloom to break the gloom

(Oops--methinks they weren't azales
As usual, my knowledge of flower names fails)
[Sunday, April 29, 2007 correction]

It's tulip time

The flowers are sublime
They cheer my heart in this chill clime
But I want a warm and sunny day
I'm tired of all the rain and gray
I want to go outside and play
It's springtime, darn it--winter, go away!

On the last day of Pesach, I was in Manhattan, davvening (praying) at Ansche Chesed. It occurred to me that, since one is permitted to carry in public on a holiday (provided that it isn't also a Sabbath), I could take the opportunity to go for a walk in my favorite parts of Riverside Park. As luck would have it, my favorite spots are a) right around the 96th Street playground, under the trees, and b) the promenade down by the Hudson River (which is on the west side of the West Side Highway), but the Upper Manhattan Eruv cuts off east of the West Side Highway, and while it extends considerably farther north outside of Riverside Park, cuts off at 95th Street inside the park. Well, famous last words. The flowers are in bloom, but the leaves are not really out yet, so the trees still looked bare, and--my luck--it was too cold for me to sit by the river for too long.

Next chag is Shavuot, and it might be too hot
I really hope not

For the time being, though, I can forget about that warm and sunny day--it's going to be pouring buckets for the next three days. !#$%!!!!!!

We already have May's flowers
I'm tired of April showers!

Blooms in bloom

My first fully-bloomed crocuses I saw today
Purple and yellow—no need to be blue, with the sun shining, too
Machalif et ha-z'manim v'yotzer or, baruch Hu

Daffodil days

I saw my first daffodils of this season just a few days ago
Baruch sheh-kacha lo b'olamo

Spring is here!
Give a cheer!
Ma adir
Shiru lo shir

I'm so thankful to Hashem for this time of year

I'm dreaming of a white Pesach

Snow, snow, go away
Don't want you at all today
Sidewalk slick makes walker sway
How I wish that it were May

It would not be our first seder with snow
As Northern folks undoubtedly know
People are sometimes sad in a cold clime
When they see no sun for days at a time

On the other hand, here are children having a snowball fight
Perhaps snow has a purpose--our kids' delight

Aish u-varad, sheleg v'kitor, ruach s'arah osah d'varo*
Maybe 'tis for our "guarantors"** that Hashem in heaven gives us snow

*From Psalm 148: "Fire and hail, snow and vapor, stormy wind does/makes/acts/fulfils (in accordance with) His word."
**From a midrash (rabbinical interpretive story) saying that our ancestors promised Hashem that their children would be guarantors of their loyalty. Or something to that effect. Could my more learned readers post the midrash in the comments, please?

"Dashing through the snow"--or not :)

(Written on the subway on the way to work this morning. To the tune of "Jingle Bells" [vu den/what else?].)

Dashing—not!—through snow
Fast one cannot go
Bundled without grace
Wind is in my face
'brella did a flip
In the wind's wild grip
Lucky that I caught a bus or surely I would slip

Oh
"Ding-dong" bell—subway hell:
"Watch the closing doors!"
Subway steps are slick with slush
I wish they'd clean the floors

But why curse? Could be worse
This, of course, we know
New York City goes berserk
With just one inch of snow

:) :) :)

"Frozen Apple"

(Original version published on a science-fiction-television message board on Jan. 19, 2000.)

The sun shines bright
It bathes us with light
But the sunlight does no good
It’s COLD in the neighborhood
It’s 4 degrees Fahrenheit
You heard what I said—that’s right!
(I’ll take a wild guess
at Celsius
About 15 degrees below?
Bleep, good grief, oh man, it’s COLD
Didn’t I tell you so?
(Canadian bloggers, don’t be bad
No teasing from the Northern folk
Good grief, it’s cold enough for me
I tell you, that’s no joke!)
It’s colder here than it’s been in years
New York, the “Big Apple,” is frozen, my dears
Out on the platform
One train comes and goes
Then two, then three, then four
Packed like sardines
You know what that means—
I can’t get in the door!
I’ll have to wait, but I’m already late
So late it’s almost a sin
But what can I do?
I’m practically turning blue
And still, I can’t get in!
Good thing I wore gloves, a hat, a scarf
A sweater and a hooded coat
Not to mention knee-high boots
With my warmest woolen suit
(There’s a sight to give one pause—
I look like a Jewish Santa Claus!)
The fifth train arrives, my spirit revives
I’m finally in the door
We’re so crammed in, there’s hardly room
For my feet to touch the floor
Don’t ask how late I got to work
You really don’t want to know
Don’t rub it in—I felt like a jerk
And on Thursday, it’s supposed to snow

(The current temperature, my friends, is 12 degrees Fahrenheit
I'm bundled up from head to toe—I'm sure I look a sight)

Winter Lace

The summer's leaves are mostly gone

(south for the winter, so to speak--
they're mostly lying on the cold, bare lawn)

Sigh
Why?

L'chol z'man, to everything there is a season
It's not much comfort, but that's the reason

So I thank Hashem for evergreens
that liven up the winter scenes

And though the winter wind may sometimes whip across my face
still, I console myself by gazing up at winter's lace
The lacy tracery of trees' bare branches e'er so high
is winter lace that beautifies the gray expanse of sky

Good vibrations??? Well, at least the test was non-invasive

The med tech strapped me down, then I
was bombarded by the vibes of an MRI
The noise was as loud as she had said--
it sounded like a jackhammer near my head
If I hadn't had the earplugs and headphones
I'd have left the room as deaf as a stone
Twenty-five minutes of lying stock still
The MRI's inventor I could kill

Please, oh please, do tell us why
You had to have an MRI

Sigh

When my foot was sore, I thought I had no worry
But when I rubbed my left sole,
I found a whole
lump the size of a blueberry
Where the heck did that come from?
How long has it been there?
So I figured I 'd best hurry up, and get some medical care
'Cause I've been known to dance, and need a healthy foot down there

Now I have to wait a week or so
'Til they decide whether it's benign or not so
And figure out which way the treatment should go

I've always felt a little strange, praying to G-d for people's health
When I'm not really even sure that I believe in G-d myself
But I decided long ago that, though I am not cert
A prayer for the sick is like chicken soup--it certainly can't hurt
So I'm asking those who're so inclined
To kindly keep my name in mind


I'm including my father's name for those who choose to use it. Please feel free to pray in accordance with your own minhag (custom).

Léah bat Esther v'Ozer

Thank you, and Shabbat Shalom.

Avishag and David

PARENTAL GUIDANCE WARNING: ADULT SUBJECT MATTER

BAIL-OUT SPACE




BAIL-OUT SPACE




BAIL-OUT SPACE

A Hebrew - English Bible According to the Masoretic Text and the JPS 1917 Edition

© 2005 all rights reserved to Mechon Mamre for this HTML version

I Kings, Chapter 1

1. Now King David was old and stricken in years; and they covered him with clothes, but he could get no heat.

2. Wherefore his servants said unto him: 'Let there be sought for my lord the king a young virgin; and let her stand before the king, and be a companion unto him; and let her lie in thy bosom, that my lord the king may get heat.'

3. So they sought for a fair damsel throughout all the borders of Israel, and found Abishag the Shunammite, and brought her to the king.

4. And the damsel was very fair; and she became a companion unto the king, and ministered to him; but the king knew her not.

My name is Avishag, you know me well
From Haftarat Chayyei Sarah, 1 Kings, Chapter 1, in the bible
I was called to lie with Daveed the King, to give him heat
But my own body’s need for heat he could not meet
All day and eve I gave him care so kind
But nighttimes, I really thought I’d go out of my mind

In your own day, is it not almost the same?
Are there not millions of Daveeds and Daveedas, if not by that name?
And myriad Avishags and Avishais without the fame?

Men and women go forth to war, and come home lame
Or blind or deaf, or maybe otherwise rent
Because of service to their country, their bodies are spent

A young man is seriously injured in an awful auto crash
And wakes up in the hospital, his body little more than trash
Barely able to speak, he’ll live in a long-term-care facility for the rest of his life
While back at home live his kids and his dear wife
Who's already raised their children for a decade alone
And will continue to do so until they're grown
Even so, almost every other Sunday, she brings him home
What should she have done, left him and made her escape
To find a man whose body was in working shape?
It wasn’t his fault, but neither was it hers—both true
If you were in her shoes, what would you do?

A young woman’s life has never been the same
Since the day she was attacked by her very own brain
Delusional for the rest of her she’ll probably remain
What good to her is her ticking body clock
When her mind is probably in a permanent state of shock?*

Humpty Dumpty fell off a wall
Like Humpty, a young man had a great fall
And all of the medical women and men
Still don’t know either how well or just when
Or even whether
he can be put back together
again
He could have become the backbone of a shul
He could have made learning Torah his lifetime's jewel
But he’s not even old enough yet to have graduated from school**

Years ago, I read a book by a quadriplegic
He made it clear that some “plumbing” is “automatic”
Some parts of the body work not by muscle, but by “hydraulics”
Still, how would a wife feel if the only way to get relief inside
Was to go ahead and steal a ride
On her husband’s automatic slide
Knowing that no matter how much she could move or swing
The man below her wouldn’t feel a thing?
Or if, to get a moment’s relief, would a husband feel
That from his own dear wife it was like having to steal
If he took ride in the tunnel of love
Knowing she would feel nothing of the rider above
If beyond a doubt you knew
That there was precious little you could do
To pleasure your spouse, what would you do?

In many places now, some will always have
Others to take care of them
But in how many cases will any of the broken in body and/or mind
Have anyone to care about them
Other than their mothers and fathers,
Who will eventually be gone
And their brothers and sisters,
Who have, or will have, spouses and families of their own?

How would it feel to begin your life
Knowing in advance that you’d never have children
Or a husband or wife?
That even though the fault is not your own
You’d have to spend your entire life alone?
And even if someone loved you enough to volunteer
Would you want such a life for a person so very dear?

Enough of this talk—I’m going to leave the rest
To the Beatles, because I think they said it best:
“All the lonely people
Where do they all come from?
All the lonely people

Where do they all belong?”

May it be Your will, my G-d and G-d of my ancestors, that You quickly send a complete healing from heaven, a healing of the spirit and a healing of the body, to these injured and/or ill:

Moshe Chanan ben Zelda v’Noam
Tzvia Aliza Tziona bat Chanah Blumah
Daveed Yoel Tzvi ben Chaya Mindel

among the ill and/or injured of the Jewish People and the world.

**Update: Daveed Yoel Tzvi ben Chaya Mindel is off my mi-sheberach (prayer for the sick) list!

*November 17, 2011 update:

*I'm happy to report that my dire prediction has proven completely off-base--Tzvia Aliza Tziona recently earned her Associate degree with honors (!), and is now studying for her Bachelor's degree at a well-known and well-respected university college. Mazal tov!

I'd love to blog, but my brain's in a fog--major project at my job

Started early, worked 'til late

Sat at keyboard 8 to 8

Stared so hard at my computer

Forgot to do Mincha altogether!

This, the day after the Number One Fast!

Hope this project soon is past

Tonight: Rinse

Tomorrow: Repeat

Life at work's not always sweet

One officemate's leaving town for the Sukkot holiday

So I'll be answering phones tomorrow all day

Which, considering this project is still not done

Will be a disaster--oy, such fun

Not much time to play in the sun

Vei iz mir--Gotta run!

I wrote this during a 10-minute break

Didn't know how long this part of the project would take

I actually left the office after 10:30

This is one dog-tired old birdie

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

A long wait for someone waiting impatiently (poem)

There he sat, on the subway, across from me
with his little girl, who looked about 3
A sippy cup of apple juice
Cheerios in a bag, so they wouldn't get loose
And a bag of fresh blueberries--I was glad
to see her share them with her dad
(And I was also glad to see
No junk food or soda for this girl--yippee!
Just two small cookies, or one big one
Or half a bar of chocolate daily for our son
to keep the "forbidden-fruit blues" away
while keeping rotting teeth at bay--
And so, today, at 23,
he's never had a cavity
And calls us from the university
Saying, "Don't buy any junk food for me
I've been eating far too much of it lately."
It really, truly warms my heart
to know I've raised a son so smart)

He sat with a notebook, pen in hand
and drew a letter A, big and grand
to entertain his little girl
then asked her to draw for him, so she drew a swirl
Absentmindly, he stroked her hair and back
And I was transported many years back
To the days when that was my husband and son
Reading together, playing baseball, having fun
When we watched "Star Trek" as a family
And rode the subways together, we three
On the way home from visiting friends
Where parents talked and children stayed
growing up together, and laughed and played
Then, on the subway, Mom--yours truly,
entertained the boychik with a Bible story
("Reuven, poor soul, just stood there in shock.
Stunned and shaken, taking stock.
'I thought the only thing we'd find here was bread!
What do you mean, "Sold into slavery?"
And all these years, I thought he was dead!
How could you do that? You never told me!")
We thought those days would never end

Now I look at the little ones
And want the same for, and from, my son

It's true, just as the young lady said
in that conversation that I overheard
There's a drawback to having waited for kids 'til I was ready
When you're an older grandparent, your legs aren't so steady
I was 34 when we had our son
His father, poor soul, was 41
(That wasn't his choice, I really must add--
he wanted to be a younger dad
But I was chicken, yessiree
So the poor man had to wait for me)
If the young'un waits 'til his dad's age, too
His poor old pop will be 82!
At that age, what can a "gramps" still do?
I guess we're going to specialize in reading books
(Well, with my skills, I sure can't teach them to cook!)
Maybe Saba CPA will teach them to add
Now there's an idea that's not half bad!
And I'll retell all my Bible stories
To the next bunch of little morning glories
To a little growing girl
who's her parents' precious pearl
To a little growing boy
who's his parents' pride and joy
Someday, a long while down the line
I hope, eventually, it'll be our time
I'm ready now, I don't want to wait
But I started late, so that's my fate

Floorway robbery, or the cleaning robot cleans up

http://store.irobot.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2172861

It's just a machine
to wash the floors clean
But at 399
the price is obscene
It's not nice
For that kind of money
I could hire somebody
to come to my home
the whole place to clean
at least thrice

Smacked in the face by the truth

I was trying and trying again and again
To write a rather long poem
In seeking a rhyme, I came up with this line:
"She wants me to leave her alone."
That thought must have been in the back of my mind
It just popped up on its own

I was stunned, upset
That was so unexpected
(That's all I can say
I have no rhyme)

Unfortunately, I've good reason to think
that the words I wrote are true
I'd really rather it weren't this way
But I know that's what I should do

And that's why I'm feeling blue

The "Missing Child" Formation--for Elie and Debbie, Aaron's parents, on his unveiling

Aaron's story is here.


In the U.S. Air Force
sometimes, when someone dies
A squadron of fighter jets flies
over the cemetery during the burial
in the "Missing Man" Formation
A squadron flying as if with five fighter jets
but with a gap in the formation,
one fighter jet conspicuously missing
in honor of the deceased

Aaron's family is now flying in the "Missing Child" Formation
and always will be

It was just a headache
or two, or three, or four,
or more
And he couldn't hold his head straight
Time to see a doctor
It was just a pinched nerve and a little scoliosis
Later, after a trip to a chiropractor
Into a neck brace went the 18-year-old

But the neck brace didn't help
The pain didn't abate
Okay, this is serious
Let's find out what this is all about
So we can have it taken care of, right away


A brain tumor?
What do you mean?
How could that be?


A trip to the hospital for an MRI


And finally, after an awful night
the dreaded, dreadful news from the doctor


Gone?


Gone???


How do you tell your other children
That their brother,
who just went in for an MRI
is already brain dead?


Shock, denial, grief

Over

and over


But please, please
No guilt
None!
Ever!

Not even the doctors had a clue
And, in any case, there would never have been anything that they could do
You did everything that good parents should, or would, or could possibly do

I would offer words of consolation,
but what words could possibly console?

HaMakom y'nachem etchem
May "The Place" comfort you

as I cannot

"The Place"

and the place

that Aaron holds in your hearts, your souls,
your memories,

that you hold in your hearts for your other children,
and that they hold in their hearts for you,

that people who care hold in their hearts
for Aaron
and for his family, too
People who tried to help you get through this
People who are there for you

HaMakom y'nachem etchem

That's the best that I can hope to do