Shabbat Poem

Cameras, cars and buses. 
Coming curious 
Driving in the dark, 
wondering about cataracts. 
When will headlights explode like mini stars?
How much darkness there is.
Eating supper alone in the dark 
arriving in the dark.

To find two candles, bread and wine.
The first supper. 
One candle to remember.
One candle to keep the Sabbath,

You start singing. 
The words come at a clip .
We have to make room
for so many to touch down 
before the night is through.

The doors  are opened. 
We turn toward the darkness 
to see who might arrive.

The bride, the Sabbath. 
Carried on her train 
into the old, old story.

A story of a small people in a big Earth
A story of being loved. 
Of being told God is love. 
And they are lovers also. 

Carrying the story within and through
fire and water and wars.
Temples built and temples trashed, 
through no man’s land and homelands 
to this palace of time.

Doors thrown open. All are welcome. 
A palace sung into existence 
crafted with story, shaped with praise, 
patterned with Psalms, lavished with lament. 
Peopled with ancestors ancient and near. 

The words written by bird feathers, 
sung onto the scroll, rolled and wrapped in brocade. 
Secreted in a closet with ceremony and song. 

Words take up space and make space. 
Say them and say them and say them 
with conviction and despair. 

Say them, fearful, greeting a stranger. 
Touch them like a lover.
Say them though the language is foreign. 
There is no map. 

Say them together. 
Feel the heat of the bodies beside you,
saying them too. 

Say the words 
say the words 
say the words 
till the Word says you.