Girl on Sunday

She held a yellowed leaf above her head,
like an umbrella, on a sunny Sunday morning
dancing to the beat of stop-and-go cars
and flickering traffic lights.

There is no one in the world but her
and she is frolicking in an April storm.

She jiggled down the street,
knees like doorknobs,
and I watched, aghast at how
little there was to worry about
on a Sunday morning.

I had woken up and breathed in the air,
knowing this would be the last day
when it was too hot for the heated house
in many months. I woke up wanting

desperately to cherish the sun
and the color. Soon it would melt,
like gruel in a pot, like over-mixed paint,
to a gray, greasy, ice-splotched winter.
I took a walk, hoping to remember

the smell of fall, and the reason for love.

Instead I found that girl, impossibly
unaware, imposing in her hopefulness
already looking past snow leaking into
the tops of boots and toward squeaking galoshes.

Only the delicacy of youth
would look forward to the rain. And only I
would wish for a little less wind on a day
that shouldn't have happened anyway.

Just Being.

I went back to Beantown this past weekend--for the first time since I left it. I was nervous getting on the plane, worried that I, and the people around me, would be too different, that things would feel weird, that I wouldn't understand or they couldn't anymore. I was bringing C with me, worried that he might not like them. I was flustered about getting judged, or judging. I was extremely scared that people would not understand.

I was wrong.

It was amazing how easy it was to simply be.

Sometimes, I wonder if I should be there....

Midnight.

Those dreams, the ones I have where we chase to the cliff and plummet. I am tried of waking up, sweating and grasping when I know that the precipice is imaginary. The dreams that used to be, a smiling mouth, gap-toothed, like an aging cemetery, shook me awoke. I could be reassured by a simple flick of the tongue,

that I was secure. Now, as a lay, clasping the edge of the mattress, in a moment devoid of passion, but wrecking of animal, I wonder what is true and false. Lately, I have lain awake, listening for the familiar reassurance of the city buses, announcing our cross streets. I know, then, that I have two feet, and am grounded. If the bus does not come, I listen for the rustle of leaves, as a car drives by. If there is no car, I hope for a dog.

If there is no dog, I begin to drift surrealist, into a world of walking clocks, and men without faces. You still have your back to me, already shaken and mummified again, from the moment I jolted off the edge of the quilt, inches from the floor.

I repeat and repeat that I am alive. And well. The words mean nothing, when I cannot see the outline of the room.

Beginning Again.

It's been an extremely long time since I've said anything and I've been too quiet most days.

Either way, school has started again with a fresh crop of students. Happily enough, the older ones have not forgotten me, but it is still saddening to have to build new relationships. Perhaps it is a personality flaw (indeed it is) but I am loathe to accept change.

The new students seem so young, even though I know they are not and the prospect of having to re-teach simple things like not talking while other people are talking and keeping your hands down while someone else is speaking seems daunting. It won't be, soon.

I then often wonder if any of these things stick. But, they do, I guess. I remember my seventh grade teacher telling us that in church, when you're praying, it is disrespectful to just leave your hands lollygagging at your sides. For some reason, her church ettiqute stuck with me, and now, I find myself, even at this age, doing what she has deemed appropriate. Perhaps, ten years from now, some small child-now-adult will find themselves in a board meeting, making sure that tehy keep their hands down while other people are talking.

An interesting prospect.

Israel 2

At a concert in several languages I could not understand,
a friend interpreted the following story told by the singer
to make meaning of the next song. There are too many layers
to be counted, a veritable trifle of confusion.

My uncle was a gentleman to the end. He visited his wife three days before her death in the hospital, dressed impeccably. She was losing her hair, only 35 kilos and hadn't been out of bed in months. He walked in, took off his hat in respect, and said to her, "Yahel, if you weren't my wife, I'd take you dancing and ask you to marry me." So should we all.

All I could think is did her veins stand out? And so,

he began singing in, the gutteral "Ch" noises calling to
someone to explain. I could not, so I sad, eyes welling up,
hoping this translation in strings, and notes, and songs
and salt made enough sense. I wondered when someone
would want to take me dancing. In a wave of fanfair,
cigarettes and words that made meaning to everyone
but me, I could only think about myself. A sea of together
and one note, atonal and confused. What if this song
was joyful, and all I could do is be a million miles

from my plastic seat and cry because of a picture on a bookshelf
of two people sitting on the moon? He, too, would have
taken her dancing. What if this song was a funeral dirge
and all I could hear was Pachabel from forty-six years ago?
She too, wore a crown, but self-proclaimed. But what if
this was the perfect song, to sing about our whispering moment
at the Mill and I didn't know?

Then the final note was sounded and amidst the claps,
which surely meant thank you, I whispered todah, which
was the only word I knew.

Wailing Wall.

I thought I would come home from the Wall
asking myself, "Where is my God?" And,
like Santa, did He receive my notes for what I would like

for life? Instead, I come back, laden with presents
to ward off the evil eye, like a pagan princess.
I come back to no new messages (of course

everyone knew I was prostrating myself
and could not be reached.) But, as I turned my back
on thick tomato sauce and walked with purpose

away from a wall of margins and lines, I now
wake up too early and wonder if I am too building
a rock on high ground, in order to fall. It is convenient

the lining up of stones amongst the three powers.
It is convenient that the cradle of civilization
was the site of all important events. The same could be said

of my kitchen table. But no one will build a shrine
around it. Except me.

Back from Israel.

I loved the trip--I loved Israel. I loved being somewhere unique to me but so not unique to the world around me in my daily life. It was hot, but there was history and a strange juxtaposition of hot pants and orthodoxy. Finally, I loved the coming home. Nothing is quite as fulfilling as that last two minutes of a plane ride when all you can think of is how wonderful it is going to be to sleep in your own bed and eat your own food. Nothing makes you appreciate the ordinary like a break from it.

However, I would very much not classify the trip as a vacation. Without a doubt, this was NOT a vacation. I came back more confused about my religion, my God, and m beliefs than I have ever felt. For the first time, I was challenged in that arena. Moreover, it was a lot of lectures, a lot of thinking--the kind of thinking I haven't necessarily done since I left school. Either way, I didn't come back refreshed or relaxed but, thankfully enough, I'm pretty sure I'm over the jet-lag.

Now, it all returns with a rush. Who to call? When to go into work? What to do next? How to do it? I feel slightly overwhelmed with a project at work. And I'm trying to book a venue, and find a time to go to DC and do 10,000 other things before I go back to work. I'm pretty sure that they're not all going to happen, not in the slightest. But, that's alright in the end, I think.... Either way, I return.