To Kneel [a #Poem]

To Kneel 

(c) Rabbi Menachem Creditor

for Landingham & Kaepernick, our angels in the wings

Sometimes, it isn't about nuance.
Sometimes it just comes down to facing the storm,
calling God out,
standing at the center of a whirlwind
holding your ground.

No cathedral is immune to agony,
no soul impervious to life itself

no nation purely noble.
If it were any other way,
there would be no need for cathedrals
in the first place.

Kneel, 

stand, 

sit, 

rise up.

To kneel is
to submit 

to lower oneself 

to step down 

to pause.

To kneel is to call attention 

to touch the Earth's face

to listen to those 

whose blood saturates 

the very roots of our story.

To kneel is to step aside 

to step outside 

to invite others to come closer 

to remember.

To kneel is not to stand

not to stand

not to stand idly by.

Speak your truth,
God damn it.

That's what God wants most of all.

We Will Do Our Best [a #poem]

We Will Do Our Best
(c) Rabbi Menachem Creditor
for Eileen Soffer, National Coordinator of Rabbis Against Gun Violence

Everybody's got guns
and we're doing our best.
But that's not good enough.

It is, 
unfortunately 
simultaneously
not good enough and true
that everybody's got guns
that we're doing our best,

When will our best be good enough?
When will the Messiah arrive?

Though 
the Good Enough 
and the Messiah 
may tarry...

...still
we will do our best.

I wish, Okay? [a #poem]

I wish, Okay?
(c) Menachem Creditor

I wish...
I wish Syrians would stop killing each other.
I wish ice cream were good for me.
I wish 9/11 never happened.
I wish Josiah Bartlet were real.
I wish laughter were louder.
I wish flowers could stop us when we pass them by.
I wish painful lessons could be a little less painful.
I wish we would turn golf courses into free public housing.
I wish Sesame Street were still on PBS.

(Did I mention that thing about Bartlet? Okay.)

I wish for one wish.
Per person.
(Okay?)