Knots

Who am I to be a leader 

I’m a giant knot of fear, hope, love and pain 

Of joy and shame 

There are so many others 

Who seem to have untangled 

The knots of their lives

Or had far less of them to begin with 

I admit that sometimes 

I can jump over mountains 

But often taking a single step feels 

Like a fool’s game 

Like I’m in the middle of a shining winter lake 

Surrounded by cracking ice 

Wouldn’t the guy in charge 

Entrust important duties 

To someone whose stride is unfailingly steady?

He must like an underdog

Or a good story

Or something 

But oh man 

Do I sometimes wish for some spoilers  

Roller Coaster

It seems that everything I’m exposed to 

I soak up like a sponge 

Til I’m sopping wet

And can take no more 

And so escape to sleep

Where the drama is reflected

And continued in dreams 

Til I can take no more 

And wake with a gasp

And a shudder 

Breathing like I just got off

A roller coaster

And thinking 

“There cannot be any more space in my brain”

Shut Up, Brain

Without reason, 

Without thought 

Our species wouldn’t have made it to the Stone Age 

But if you try and think your way to answers about everything

You get trapped in a web of your own design

The only way out is to acknowledge that at end

Thought itself is wondrous and defies explanation 

And though it is a tool 

More vital than anything we make with our hands 

As an essential mode of being human

It comes in (distant?!) second to awe 

Go Big or Go Home

How do I express

Something not expressible?

I’m so tired of holding it in 

But so afraid of what happens 

When it comes out 

To be believed 

To not be believed

Which is more tiring?

Which is more frightening?

41 years 

5 fully awake

Worn out to the bone 

Just starting to live

If two rabbis don’t agree

On the meaning of a verse in the Bible 

How can I hope for 

Clarity to persist any longer than a lightning flash?

Well, says I, 5 years ago 

I wouldn’t even have conceived of the 

Possibility of the lightning flash

So you can’t blame me now

If I hope for 

The full light

That’s stronger than the sun 

(Don’t) Blot Me Out

When God told Noah to build the ark 

He listened but did not try and intercede 

On behalf of his fellow man

And the earth was flooded

When He told Abraham that Sodom and Gomorrah were doomed, Abraham pled to spare the cities 

If 5 righteous men could be found therein

They were not found

And the cities were destroyed

After the sin of the golden calf

When God told Moses He would destroy Israel

And make a new nation from him

Moses went further than Abraham

And said, “If you do not save this people

Then blot me out too from your Book of Life”

God accepted his prayer

And Israel was spared 

Moses is accorded the greatest righteousness 

Of the three, and the lesson is clear

Who are any of us without our fellow man?

But if you ask me how I would feel upbraiding God and daring him to blot me out 

The answer would be scared shitless 

Surprise Party

For so many years

Uncertain as to why my mind kept forcing me in obsessive loops

Why fear would crop up 

When the day was sunny 

When all was well

And finally to know

That the weight 

I thought would drag me down

I now use to drag the world forward

Until we arrive at the end

That is a beginning 

That when I close my eyes

Beneath all the multiplying metastasizing  distractions and terrors 

There is not dark 

But light 

Is better than any surprise party

A middle-aged man could hope for 

A Thousand Winters

What’s it like to be me?

I’m getting better at explaining it, maybe

All days long thoughts hit me like blows

With force enough to stagger

And I have to try and distinguish

Which ones to ward off

And which to embrace

Thank God

That once in a great while

A thought hits that I know

Did not come out of my own mind

And brings with it enough light

To last a thousand winters 

Light

Where are You?

Help me to help to bring You here for good

According to Your wishes

In Your good time

What was the name of Bat-Sheva’s first child?

Did Mephiboseth receive justice?

Who moved David to number Israel - You or a force of darkness?

Who was L?

Who is E?

Where is C?

Who am I?

I am יצחק

Where will it end?

When will it begin?

Why does every certainty bring more questions?

I’ve got a long way to go

But a long time to get there

In one piece 

God is Truth

But don’t be fooled by false concessions from Heaven 

Pray militantly

Never submit 

But how about reverence?

God sent the angel to destroy

Then pulled him back

God stretched His hand out to destroy

Then pulled it back

The promise is forever

The pain seems like it’s forever

Why did…

David’s sin was inexcusable 

The punishment catastrophic

But his house survives

To this day

Let none of this be in vain

Let none of this be a waste 

Come quickly, O God

And be our Light in the darkness

As you were David’s

Sins and all

Just Wake Up

Sometimes I wake up in terror

Convinced that I’ve messed it all up

My breathing stays heavy for minutes 

Until I start to understand 

That my dream went so wrong at the end

Because I fought for a few extra minutes of 

sleep

Instead of forcing myself awake

And returning to a world

Which while frightening 

Is not as bad

As the things I do to myself

When my mind is still trying to fend it off

Modern Children

I read the words of my ancestors 

I hear the songs of my heroes

And I think

I cannot do this 

Their thoughts are so clear 

Assured, confident 

They leap off the page 

Out of the speaker 

Urging me on

Lighting a path for me to follow

I feel the grandeur of their consciousnesses

The clarity of their visions 

The intensity of their longing 

The burning fires of their wisdom

What do I have to offer

In my little home

With my clumsy, jagged thoughts

Chained to my tiny screen

With tired eyes

Like all of us 

Modern children

Only a pioneer can be an heir

And only an heir can be a pioneer 

So help me see it through 

And make sure I don’t go

Exploring off

In the wrong direction

You Should Rejoice

It was the kind of dream it hurts to wake from

Not just because we were together

But because we were ‘really talking’

As you’d have put it

And I had the right words

Though they started to slip away

Even as I spoke them 

As I slipped back towards wakefulness

And away from you 

But I’ll try to put down some of them here 

You were mentioning 

All the exhaustion and uncertainty 

And even despair that you’d lived

And I said you should rejoice

Because these are symptoms of the heart

And that I knew 

The Being to Whom we return

Is concerned with matters of the heart