J. L. Gordon St: A One-Street Poem
© Rabbi Menachem Creditor
I wander.
Just a normal morning walk
past coffee shops and cracked pavement,
pedestrians, dogs, and bicycles.
I lift up my eyes.
"Miklat Tzibori/Public Bomb Shelter"
on a sign over an agency
for handicapped children.
I wonder:
Can any morning walk
under such a reminder
be normal?
I lift up my eyes.
A construction site
for an already-sold out
apartment building,
a crane overhead
bearing its burden.
I wonder:
Has ever before
been dreamt into reality
such a holy tool,
capable of defying
the very ground upon which it stands?
I lift up my eyes.
The ocean,
crashing as it always has,
salt and water, remnants of
all that has ever been
all that is
all that will ever be.
I wander
down still-soft pavement,
remove my shoes,
revel in soft, warm sand,
soak in glorious sunshine,
rejoice at the sounds,
of my children's laughter.
And I know:
We are the cracked pavement,
the salt and the water,
the shelter and the laughter...
Wandering.
Wondering.
Eyes. Always. Lifted. Up.
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° menachemcreditor.org