Oh Staying Up Late...

Sadly, college students are sometimes forced to stay up later than any other reasonable human being because of homework issues.

This is a poem for class that I agonized over, and it wasn't even mentioned or looked at or thought about by the teacher. I kill myself for nothing.

I like the poem, but I'm not sure that it completely fulfilled the requirements, so I'm not even going to share what they were with you (I'm writing this, I can do that hehe). Nevertheless, I hope you enjoy the products of working at one in the morning.

Without End

The Torah is rolled out completely,

Every person supporting the sacred

Text, so that it can be read from the end

To the beginning without pause.

I don’t want to sit in temple

And pray in a language I only know

One word of.

Though the word feels complete and whole,

The mysteries of prayer and sermon

Are lost on me, flapping their wings ineffectually on my back.

All I can say is Shalom.

And I am not called to explain

Only to express.

And I sing, better than some of the

Old members of the rather small, pathetic choir,

But I could never coach my voice to hear

G-d.

The cantor has. Even her guitar is imbued

With that faith and love.

The great fields

Of light remain dark to me.

I have lit the candles

I have said the prayers

I have sipped the wine,

Cracked the matzo,

Read the transliterations

Given another voice to the song,

Thrown breadcrumbs in the river,

And never understood.

I am a twig caught in the eddies of tradition,

Moving in circles,

Never going anywhere, but going on

Forever.

Baruch atah Adonai

There is a great

Chasm between the words

And their meanings.

I fall into the abyss.