;.cConsolidated ox
;.l1,3,63,66,1,0,10,79,192,2,15,20,25,127,10,0,
;.l2,10,75,192,2,15,127,20,0,
;.l3,10,79,192,2,15,20,25,127,10,0,
;.l7,20,90,193,2,30,40,50,60,70,80,127,20,2,
C O N S O L I D A T E D   O X :

=

IN SEARCH OF THE OX WITH THE GILDED HORN
(Collected poems with at least some Jewish content)

+

 MORE OX
                                                                 
(Subsequently collected poems with at least some Jewish content)
Tishrei 5748 to Nissan 5749



Typed by

Stephen Benjamin Amdur                          
P.O. Box 23529
Jerusalem 91234
.h2,CONSOLIDATED OX       ----
.p
Hootenanny at the College Co-op

*This wandering Jew
unshaven, pack on his shoulder
moving from town to city and country
no special pain in having no home
only the dull pain in knowing he can have no home.
{Others, tranquil as sailboats in a dead calm,}  
laugh at him because he cannot laugh.
at week's end, gathered with his fellows on some bare floor
sad folk songs mingle with the darkness

                          Oberlin, Grey Gables, 1958 {reconstr.}

---------------------------------------
.p

 *Lines written under the influence of Carl Shrager's Panama Red

Miraculously, the water parted
they passed through to Mt. Zion.
To one
   (he to whom the God once spoke
   in the silence in the heart of the fire in the veins of a bush)
the God spoke again
and the  W O R D
		   of infinite delicate complexity
                                             was revealed as LAW
Blinded he returned
to seal his mountain-top tomb with the shattered calf,
and the   W O R D   was hewn on stone tablets.

		Mendocino, 1967.
			to Susan Harrison

-----
Panama Red Take 2

One day one lamb erred --
when he risked all to save it
the G-d spoke
through the silence in the fire of the veins of a bush.

          
                      The midwives, magnanimously, are blessed;
                      miraculously, the waters break; we pass through.          
    
	Called, one should leave at once, without question, taking,   	presumably, drink and food for a day or two.  He stayed forty; 	practical men presumed him dead.

called back, reluctantly
mind filled with the         W O R D
of infinite delicate complexity
colored by "a symphony of divine emotions"

                                         
        violence of self-mocking drunken voices
        embittered coarse laughter of trivialized women
        belched and farted burnt flesh
        under the filthy glare of that monstrous molten calf

collapsed, shattering forehead tablets

modulating descent of the sublime
the price of forgiveness is concealed

the WORD, again, was revealed
but revealed as LAW
hacked into two stones.


                                           rev. Belmont, 1984

Refs:  but Akiva says, "first finish planting your tree."
       Quote from PVK.


*Babylonian Shaharit

Pausing before entering
I drape over my shoulders
and knot the imperial gartel
  yoke of bondage
about my neck:
  'let my soul not see
   nor mind comprehend
   what I put  my kishkes through
   to earn my daily quiche'
Senlin says.
          
            Cambridge, Mass. Autumn 1984

Ref:	Conrad Aiken, "Morning Song of Senlin":
    	"Stars in the purple dusk above the rooftops
    	 pale in a saffron mist and seem to die
    	 and I myself on a swiftly tilting planet
    	 stand before a glass and tie my tie."

------
.p
                        

*the valleys are filled with mist
from each rise I find myself, surprised
still climbing the distant mountain.
                (Lama Mtn., ca. 1969)
--------------

*the ancient grape-vine
sparkling "wine of ecstacy"
crystal Kiddish cup

        Abode of the Message, 1981 

-----

*Full moon on the waves
Elul, August; August, Elul
a seagull turning

          Penobscot Bay, Maine, 1982
---------------

*Menorahs of clay
Dreidels spin like dervishes
The light of your eyes

        Hanukah 1982 -- to Noor

-------

*Boddhisatva taxi-driver
longing to see everyone safely home,
how could you ever guess
where each one really goes
and when?

                 (Talpiot, Jerusalem, 1987)
----------

       with an arched  breath of heaven
       porpoises dance through the depths

----- 
*Blue-green Poem

        (1)
Glimpsing her standing outside, praying,
I notice my muddy boots.

        (2)
Sun blown free of the clouds
beam of light
in a pond's green depths --
her glance.
                                         (Meor Modi'in, 1989)
------------
*trying to go "from strength to strength"
lonely valleys between cresting waves.
-------------------------------------------------------------
.p
*

few pale stars above
waning moon in the western sky
tzitzit - rose dawn-beams

eastern sky lightens
pale green, pale blue
dark blue, the lightening moon

crows and bluejays call
a mist blows over the pond
from the heron's tree

cornstalks turnign brown
rabbits walk across the road
white-tail deer bound off

mint, sage, basil, thyme
diamond dew on the garden
motley of pale greens

     behind the blue sky
     yellow sun bursts forth in joy
     like s strong woman

in the stone-cooled hhall
flute note in the quiet air
earth foods at noontime

golden light, green gardens
the birds are setting up camp
pensive time, Yitzhak

Kaballat Shabat
sun setting behind the hills
bright colored palace

cool of day drifts back
spectrum of darkening blues
looking for three stars

 
                            Ruach Camp - Abode of the Message
                            1982. 1983
                            to Noor
.p
HOMILIES

How to Pick Apples

If you
know where you'll be
"if the bough breaks"
& know where you'll be
if that bough breaks
then you can pick apples.

-----

*Picking Apples Take 2

Know
where you will be
if the bough breaks
and if the bough breaks
where will you be;
then
you can pick apples.

-----
Down-shifting


*Whistling in the dark, two tightrope walkers call forth light beamsthrough dusty air, to meet at intersections of imagination, until daybreak.


Falling, the acrobat
thanks the veil.

    
     Tired of spiritual crises?
     Have a drink.
          (Home from a hard day on the front,
           the soldier goes out to a cafe.)
-----------
*To play
ping-pong
defensively
stay quite attentive
reacting as needed.
Don't scheme.
-----
BASKETBALL:

*When someone's closer
pass;
when you're closest
shoot.
-----
In the right seas
a sailboat accepts, at last
the waves,
drawn by a chosen mark.
-----



*Swimming across a lake -- 
don't get half-credit

     (Knickerbocker Lake, Boothbay (Maine), 1950.  Et seq.)
 -------------
*an old man walks to the corner
fighting harder than a mountain-climber
each mitzvah a peak.

-----
*Occasionally to sketch in a few clear strokes some minor usefulact...
-------------

*Impecabbly businesslike
 the bum insists on a shekl.
Some days the best I can do 
are mitzvot ha-agarot.

    Ref:  10 agarot = 1/10 shekel = apr. $0.16
          agara (Pl. agarot), Gr., Heb.  marketplace

------


.P

"With 1 tochas, one can't dance at 2 Weddings":

*One mountain, many trails
how impatiently I change
greedy for every sight
trying to avoid each cliff
               Old City, Jerusalem, Easter, 1985:
--------
*To savor the wine
not eat the earthen kelim
-- how slowly I learn.
-----
.P
Bum's Zen

nothing on my back
anchor to tomorrow
look dumb, stay loose, all eyes 

go with the flow
roll with the waves
slip into the darks, sleep with the earth
when you're cold, shiver


Look like you ain't worth eating
walk softly
think with your feet
look ahead
listen behind
act dumb but
in case of potential danger
immediately accelerate, detour around it quick, and revert invisible
(except, if they intercept you
act chickenshit
until you can)                                   zip through a winDOW!
            
------
who else can we be
but the little boy and girl from the Palace
who lost their Father
who lost their Mother
who find each other
who else are our friends
but those wise-eyed bums.

Unexpectedly I glimpsed Her or Him
at the edge of a crowd.
The courtiers won't let me pass --
my bastard brothers.
he moment passes; a bum again.

------------

.P

*Conceptual Distinctions from the Harvard College Succah

If, eg
the, eg, Lubavitcher
Rebbe were to say
(Heaven forfend),
"Yiddele, we may now eat pork"
all his hassidim would say,
"Our holy master has
(Heaven forbid)
flipped out.  
----

I do not understand:
my father of body and love
and my father who gives us clean souls
both 
      were going to shochet me.
My friends the angels stopped them.
Now when the sun has stopped shouting
commands I can't hear
I go for a walk
to ask the field-flowers why.

-----
.p
 *12--21REVISIONIST AKEDA

I.
No.

Temptations from devils;
  farts and belches of your own mind:
Fattest idol can't be the Highest;
Blind obedience's fate of slaves;
Test's to hold your own ground.

	Signs & wonders -- madness'
	booby prizes.
	Distasteful battleground.

	  Angel and devil
	  the two inevitable servants
	  accompanied him.
	  An old man spoke plain sense and raised his staff;
	  cast away again, Ishmael's sickly smirk behind our backs.
	  My father's madness called down a wadi flood
	  that only madness could cross.

	The wood was heavy;
	clumsily I stumbled and fell many times, of course
	and that damnable fire would not go out.

A HAND blocks the Place
as he pressed forward, through his whirlwind --

	unable to move
	and my father suddenly so small
	soul surged through opening heavens
	and say, the say, "The Awe of Issac"
	handing my life back to me, as grace

my Mother had become a ram, nestling in the PALM.

	As the silver knife dropped to earth
	his strength passed to me as a robe.

	Whole, in the peaceful cool of the day
	we did not speak again,
	and went to separate Sabbaths. 

She returned just once, to show me, afar
a strong slender girl descending in golden light
to return laughter to my soul
living under my mother's peace
in the Light of our Lord.


.p
II.

Redeemed but bedazzled at last by Light
		(our Lord is magnanimous
		 herbs cooking in venison stew)
time to sanctify, at least, my own first-born
whose birthright is to santify that Place
let him redeem our mistakes.
No sharp tools; not burning flesh
but sanctified laughter of men and women shall ascend
like incense, like music.


I dream of a Temple of peace
built on no man's back and bone
just piled-up field-stones, free-hand  chosen 
where the poor man may dip his bread in salt
by ancient olive trees.
Who would wage war on the hills?

                         
                              Pesach 5744, Sukkot 5745  Belmont, Mass.
                              (Olympia, Summer 1988)


.p
                           
l3
                                           
"A quiet man, living in tents"

	           "...nor could I have known
	               whose heel I grasped, my brother's or my own."
Delmore Schwartz, "Jacob"
  
from a far field
my father's shadow in afternoon
reflected mountain in a still lake

grain waving in the wind
and the Age of Abel passing
	one dreams, occasionallly --
	to raise up first-cut sheaves....

my brother races to forests
fleet as a wolf

 on the cook-fire
 stew of the fruits of the earth
 drying herbs hung about my tent

wild brother in animal skin
sliding down the dry mountainside, tumbling stones
threw himself on the goats' watering trough
drank like a great cat
and burst through my door

ate without pause
(I dared one demand)
he laughed it away
and left to his wives.
He tolerates me.
We parted friends.


That day, my father dying
my mother moved calmly, postponing grief
as if she were heir to his peace
steering my destiny through that fateful, labored masquerade
		 -- wheelbarrow in a muddy rutted field --

laughter tears and rage
(virus forte) 
one of my brother's rabbits now
mocked by that stolen blessing
		                            JACKPOT JAKE HITS THE TRAIL
			                       WITH THE FAMILY JEWELS

always listening (shema, shema)
hoping only for begrudged shelter
in my mother's land


	I know livestock.  That helps.

  ...
  our son, our son at last
  his dreams recalling me to the truth of my own...


Egyptian Eating Brown Rice

Belatedly the Butler recalled his omission;
the tzaddik was bathed and was raised
up from the prayers of poverty
"...but it is easy to forget, at our ease"

	Ref:  after a teaching by John Gomez, Taos
		 Cf. Heraclitus, Fr. Bywater 108

-----
.p


Two flowers floating on a pond
amidst a consternation of handmaidens.
Imagine that moment's glance.


I.                              

In a recurring dream
she stands by the Riverbank, watching
very concerned
my sister.

     It's cold and dark and damp -- I'm scared
     Mother had me taken home
     They called my mama
     One day they sent her away again.


II.

Having given one's tutors the slip
investigated that dusty storeroom
scrolls no-one dared destroy
Great-grand-uncle, administrative genius malgre lui,
rainbow boy become father to the Father of the Land
     and ours a mean little viper of hate....


III.

It's all so distant
dried and blown on as dust
Bedouin life
     my wife an oasis, our sons Palms
     yes, yes
Strength from the air and light
stars my teachers

One's temper, faith, patience may break
I struck out
empty-handed

The Mountain sighs 'above, beyond'
the desert echos echad
.p


Prophet followed by Little Men in White Suits

Such callers don't leave cards,
and an option of retrospective distinction
after life in the hell of interminable equivocation
seemed an imprudent investment.

Fighting the waves of my mind
                       ("keep it under your hat, Gyro Gearloose")
"I went down to -- 
                     Pireus", Joffa, 
                                     "Hell, Tarshish!"
                                      (thank heaven for money)
skulking around friends
who said I appeared a bit preoccupied

and lied my onto a boat.  One copes.
	...with my back to the wall of a courtyard cafe
	at the edge of the world, where the air is clear and calm...

and the rise & fall of the hull
(get some sleep, get some sleep)
confirmed my error, erring
tchuve, tchuve, wailed the wind
	the sin we all dwell in is no ground for guilt
	yes, yes, repent all your vicious little excesses of despair   but turn, "return to the land of your soul"

One must pretend as long as possible that nothing's happening
	sling the bull with the tars
	rest in the shade of simple atheists
		damnit, goodness strong as oars pushing on heavy swells
instant taslick, they cast me away
taslick, taslick, lapped me back on shore

"That looks like Jonah,
 and he looks like fish-puke.
 Been on a bender buddy?"
      Have some of our wine --
      hell, have it all."

To damned mad at last
for conscientious objection
                                         "any way the wind blows"
I went where they wanted
                "to the hookers who move in mysterious ways, boy")
trying to at least not look the part
(thank heaven for clean clothes and money);      
walked three days through that beige metropolis
and went through the motions.
They listened with the indifferent courtesy of the rich
and declared another festival of despair.
Naturally nothing happened.
.p

Glutted with godly melodrama and popular farce
I elected to die in  simple dignity.
A lady older than my ancestors
brought me under her arbor.
It shriveled; I gained weight.
Gradually the voices trailed away
and left me my mind back, like it or not
hideously bored again,
stakes back to my favorite, chicken-drops 
but this time I was broke for real.
There was no point, any longer, in not going home.
-----
.P


Let us begin by pretending
that once upon a time
(say, amidst Musaf of Shemini Atzeret)
a scraggly goat with the scarlet ribbon
walked up on the steps of the Temple
unto the High Priest
and said:
"buddy gimme 2 buckets of cool spring water
and a quarter-bale of your best alfalfa
fresh-cut.
Ribbon's still red.
Redistribute this necklace of minature monsters
that vomit my voice
to your flock to repent for themselves;
still time if they work quick.
Maybe I'm your Elijah."


The High Priest replied to the goat:
"Elijah or not,
eat your hay and go back
    to the desert of Sinn
that the rains may soothe your thirst
and the ribbon turn white with your bones.
If they could then they would have;
let us begin by pretending."

               Kefalonia, motzi Shemini Azeret, 1988



l2
Notes:
    Briefly:  Cf. eg Kitov on Yom Kippur; also the account inmusaf Yom Kippur, suggesting that the atonement of YomKippur was seen as prerequisite to the advent of thelife-giving autumn rains.  The argument, of course, isover the role of delegated ("priestly") atonement; thetone is eg that of Dostoievski's Grand Inquisitor.  Sinnis part of the southern Judean desert.  The phrase 'hardtravelin' is that of Woody Guthrie, z'lb.
-----

.P
In Search of the Ox with the Gilded Horn

Lao-tzu once more
and/or that baffled butterly
one another's dream
olim "as those who dream"
awakening from discovered troubled sleep
into another dream
unable to build up or tear down
unwilling to sacrifice
desert or pillars of light
                            (1985)
------------------------
Birds sing shacharit.
Crazed man and awe-stunned boy
toil up Mt. Moriah
as traffic streams to Tel Aviv.
The sons of Aaron wash their feet
and gape at Herod's folly.
Korbanot and auto exhaust
pollute the air.
                          (1986)
----------------- 
Yom Kippur Shir HaMalot

Less like Nehemia's exiles
rebuilding the Temple brick by brick
than those squabbling crews of priests
whom Jesus wept over
forseeing that their 'causeless hatred'
would tear it down.
                      (1987)
-----------------
.p

Gush Emunim Dream

Loud banging on our Clubhouse door
Guy in a red-check sports-coat:
"Shemi Messias
 Hashim sent me
 I'm taking over."
"OK."

-----

and Shemi Messias
spake unto the members of Members Only
& he says
You're all redeemed
I just bought Beelzebub's Hockshop
on Hashim's credit card
& tore up all the tickets
You can all go learn at Yeshiva
says he.

-----
One Tenth of Av
Kotel Plaza stayed shady all morning.
For three weeks
everyone was lined up halfway back to Lod
to see the Temple.
Then things went back to normal, more or less
except for the tourists.

------

"Would ye but heed my voice"

Every day in Jerusalem
a drunk says
"I'm back.  Came back in '48.
"'t'vin?   Gimmee now!"




.p
*The desert town of Narishkeit

A quaint domain of black-and-white
where 
      (despite rectilinear agitation)
nothing really changes
and everything has her place.

Their world of ideas is an apiary.

The Mayor's city walls,
just mud and straw,
have collapsed into gaps and traps.
     (Imagine, say, the "chambermaids" locked out
       and an overfed jackal shut in.)
Meticulously inspected each day, they
may not be repaired
until the Police-Chief-Designate appears
and, having proved his identity to the 
Proper Acting Authorities annexes the rest of the world.

---------------------------------
If my tourist's euphoria
collapse into consternation
at, say, kashrut
it's that this incredible contraption
     ossified golem
having run unattended onto unforseen highways
is now doing all the wrong things.
------

*but mark that
these black-hat acrobats
tumbling through heavens
happen, apparently, to
land neatly on their feet

(Imagine, "one misty morning, early"
 ten assembling, shielded in grey cloaks
 whose lining comprise the rainbow.)

------------------------------------
but by the time bet Josef had squeezed through mitzraim
he'd become color-blind
and wore black-&-white
for his rainbow.
----------------
and the voice of Moses
sapke unto the Malevah Malka of the Midrahov
saying
"P.S.:  
Hear, all ye daughters of the earth and sons of the land,
What's not good for you, don't eat.
Daiyenu; the rest is vanity.
Pass the word down to the rabbinute.
L'hitraot."

------
.P
GESHER T'ZAR M'OD:

She loves a brit; 
so quaint despite the baby
and feeds her Seder as a snack
 to the Fishy-Folk.
                                       

Talit katan -- second skin
tzitzit like whips

smirking children playing with the fringes

                       
covered in halaka
lightly as a beautiful tallis


               
Jonathan Daniels asked the haredim
"Is Tai Chi avoda zara?"
and the haredim answered
"Lama?"


---------

.p

after 40 years b'midbar
they retired to Miami
bequeathing us one-way Charter fare.
How awkward their visits
forever exiled.
------

Jeremiah on a Bicycle

Xerox Mincha and clock out
Shmitta
scars of smog in the valleys
fear Father's tears of fire.

    Refs:  "Sow it in the Mountain, reap it in the valley
            you gonna reap just what you sow.
            G-d gave Noah the rainbow sign;
            won't be water for the fire next time."
                Appalachian Folk Song
--------------- 
.p
RABBONIM HILLONIM
.A2

Protest strike

Last  summer
Jonathon Daniels
stopped wearing a hat.

----------------------------

l1
To honor the Creator they pay others to cleanse their clothes inpoisons.
-------------------                              
*
The 2 Head Rabbis
of the Holy Capitol City of Jerusalem
are supported
in Tel Aviv
by a hidden tzaddik
who dances
each Friday night
on a bar
bottomless.

-----
*speeding to Mincha
the rabbi's driver honks.
-----
"Jews for Nothing"

As Plato's prisoners
found the light less blinding
they looked for walls;
finding none
thought themselves nowhere.

This year the haredi
constricted the Infinite to a stifled cry
so my soul flees to Tel Aviv
finding release in the celebration of the shuk.

-----------
Too embarassed to pick off his lice
he hits 'em with a hammer
too embarassed to admit it
he extends the favor to everyone:
the born-again miniature man.
-----
     those crows; those
	damned American blackbirds
	gloomy guf's      
Dark Ages from the waist down
black from pumps to top-hat
------

*As sunset colors rise to the crescent moon
and are pushed back into the sea by blue-black night
unrolling to reveal three stars,
men sit inside houses of prayer
capped in black.

-----

Many year later realized,
and  wept then -- Essau,
still breathless from running through  forest trails, green
chewed up birthright
pale black bookworms.
-------------

*Remus Rebus Rerun

doty dadi rabi don't you
  piss in the stream
now the fish can't see
good; gotto go upriver
try to try again
doty dadi rabi you can stand right there now
but
better button down
your fly, bye 'n bye.

-----
On Hof Tzitzit

I seek in the sight
of a a boyish girl with perfect breasts
relief from our cold winter's reign
of blows and piety.
Muse may I now praise
fresh-caught lobster quickly boiled; scallops fried in wine:
through such innocent communions
may we from hubris be redeemed.
------

*the Rebbe's indestrubible picture
followed me around all summer
reproachfully.
-----
*and yet
if our Rebbe said
the moon was made of green cheese
and we're all going there for shal shudes,
I'd forgo the cholent
at lunch.

-----                                       

.P

MEN AT WAR  (WITH ONE ANOTHER)

In the Athenian National Gallery
Poseidon's balls
look ordinary and vulnerable.
I re-cross the sea to land
"tender and faint of heart."*

L2
Refs:    Leviticus?? exempts from military service, inter alia,those who are "tender of heart" and those who are "faintof heart".
----    
l1
I must conscientiously object
to the obtuseness of the bullet
or rather, its arrogance:
how with one vulgar far it undoes
evolution, gestation, nurture
and even dreams.
----
Poet Preparing to sneak out of Milluim

Most peculiar computers
sqishy liquid crystals
why with so much artifice
would you run
to throw through each other
burning metal. 

     Notes:

                       "I love my flag, I duely do
                        that flutters in the breeze.
                        I also love my fingers, toes, 
                        and arms and  legs and knees.
                        One cannon ball could jar them so
                        or give them such a twist
                        that they'd do me no good at all;
                        I think I won't enlist."
                    
                                     Anon., Cambridge? University, WWI
-----

Armed only with slingshots
they wait by moonlight
in rocky olive groves
steadfast against the imperialist march
of suburbia.

     :Commuter Blues

-----                  
"I don't work
except on myself"
No time for that here;
do what you can or go home.

-----




each day they sacrifice
two
Arabs
breaking waves against the walls of 'Akko

     Cf:  T.E. Lawrence, Intro to "7 Pillars of Wisdom":
"For generations they had been throwing themselves, like waves..."

-----
Leila, leila

like popcorn
or rain on a window-pane
bounding a dark night
machine-guns on the range

                  (Moshav Meor Modi'in)

--------------
Mickey Mouse Boot Camp

     "that we should bruise our aged flesh in cruel armour"
                     Shakespeare, Henry the 3 4 or 5

or Haverat Bill on Frango:
"He ate, he shat; he's a good dog."
body on overdraft
dream anachronistic
I observe the perversity
of courting the vulnerability of bodies
                                       
Innocent as Adam or the dog
body does his duty
though mind grow gross:
We die only of cummulative regret.
-----

Uzis like airplanes
change nothing --
superfluous accessability.

-----

*Home Guard 

Pre-dawn Sunday:
dressed in my battle-gear
I kick out the cat.
                                       
-----
.p


as she said shalom 
  to her daughter
so, l'hitraot
naked, life-giving
  body to body
heroine of Ras Burka
l2

    Notes: (Would be neater in Hebrew.  Ref:  On Ras Burka, in theSinai, Israelis swimming nude were machine-gunned by anEgyptian soldier who, according to the officialexplanation, went beserk.  One woman saved her daughterby lying on top of her.  The soldier was imprisoned, andsubsequently suicided.)

l1

-----
.p
ON THE TALE OF THE SPIES (Numbers 13:32-33)

I did not want to leave the desert
afraid of cities
I went back, all at sea

rolling over desert waves
the sun all day, the sun
summer sky, pale blue & white
the sea rocks zikr

but your were a star
cool, pale, in evening blue
(Mily Way, "Road to the Isles")
bright amidst nightshades
steady in rose-hued confusion of dawn
at the gates of a new day

earth woman, soft browns and greens

                                 (Penobscot Bay, 1982.  To Ciel.)

---------

Alouche said
"whatever your faith,
if you feel at home here
it is your home.
But if you do not love this land
it will 'devour' you." 

-------
*Surpised, the Giants
watched the spies trying to hide:
"We was fixin' them supper
what they gonna eat?"
"Maybe each other."

------
Burn-Out

With what invevitable grace
Frodo Baggins goes down
from the greening Shire
across the grey ocean.
The Spies warned us:
to love the headstrong young
is a fire of dry twigs
(land, girls like blossoming trees)


Refs:  Tolkien (3 Towers, last chaptr; "it is a land that devours theinhabitants thereof; yerida, lit. 'going down', to emigrate fromIsrael.
--- 

"Giants!" cried the spies
"relatively speaking" the Sages replied;
and to this day B'nei Israel still won't build
American-sized beds.
-----
.p

PLACES 

*teenage mother
holds up her baby
to watch the passing train.

	Nahariya Junction, Oct. 18, 1988

------------
*Sitting, I suspect, opposite
the old family hotel
blown to rubble 36 years ago,
at a table for 4 --
what ghosts invited me today?

     Cafe Nash, 10 Ben Yehuda St., 9/21/86
--------
Men graceful as leopards with cubs; determined woen like turquoisebirds.
----
"The longing of the Mountain for the Lake"
     (R. Nachman, Tale of the 7 Beggars) 
air of Tiverya
white wine heavy with woodruff
air of Zfat
spirit purer than clear cold water.
-----
Roadsings in the Holyland
gravestones over history.
-----
and too the scrolls of our land's old ways
are buried in time like pot-shards,
fragments of a palace past.                                           
-----                                    
*In an Academic Mode,       or          Below Har Nof

What great wraiths again contend
in wind-swept skies of rain
for mastery of this capital
I cannot tell, 
but wake each day more tired
my body twisted to defend
many unseen fronts.

-----
l1
*Like a musical bubble of light  transmuting elapsed time intosurpassed space, the bus floats through a colored black summer night.

------












       An Ambivalent Pilgrim....

In quest of Jewish roots
he comes overland to eretz Israel
bearing a tinned ham.

-----
l1
                                     ...And  A Reluctant Confession

I must
        I suppose
admit:
        I fed
               (forgive me, please
                                    when
                                          or rather, 'if'
                                          you read this)
               the  campground   cats
               that dam'd canned ham.

------
 *
 ...daring to ford one last flood
 before the Holy City
 of cold rushing
 autos, I'm busted
 by a lady cop
 for jaywalking.
---------------

*trudging back to Base
Walkman Mozart symphony --
an interminable kilometer!


-----
*FILO

The Lubavitcher Rebbe
confines himself to Galutz
while Hasidim duplicate his Brooklyn Townhouse
brick by brick
in the orange-fields of Philistia.

     Ref:  FILO, "First In, Last Out", accounting term
------
.p

CALENDAR:

silver sword, candle flame
they would have destroyed us utterly


*Hanukah candles:
last spirited leap of flame
as wax is consumed.
         (Belmont, 1982)
-------
sun beams from behind clouds
strike the mountain-top city
(and G-d as a wild horse,
 escaping names and names of names like lasoos)
A Mitzvahmobile, hell-for-accelerator
drags down Main St.
carrying an electric Menorah.
(candle-flames delicate as a woman's smile
 patches of sun on cresting waves)

(Tiverya, Hanukah 1985)
------------------------------

My brother writes, briefly:
"We fear you'd try to convert our children."
Almond trees blossom,
followed by pink mish-mesh.

--------------------------
moon racing through scattered clouds
dios d'eteleito boule*

re-reading the Megillah to Bach's Art of the Fugue
while a drunk in tzitzit bops me on the head with a collapible    squeaking plastic day-glo hammer'
thinking he's happy...
     Purim sameach --
Angels enjoy interplays of archetypes
But that girl, fresh as myrtle
softened in scented oils for 12 months like a castrated lamb,
snack for a pig to make nice to -- 
only the right to defend ourselves
tragic dignity.

(Oasis Cafe, Jewish Quarter, Old City, Purim 1986)


          *Homer, Iliad I, "the god's plan working itself out"
---------------------------------
taxicab home from the Seder
interrupts the flight from Egypt
"tchuve, tchuve," robins sing.
-----------

*after Shaherit
how beautiful the tulips
Shushan Purim morning.        

-----
*Peach-trees in blossom
waning quarter-moon of Nisan
in the pardes
your Japanese chametz
is up a tree

"we have forgotten the tree"
perhaps the birds once knew

l7
  
Ref:  Elie Wiesel plays Hungarian Favorites on the Hammond Organ
------------
l1

*as faces in a mosaic
revealed only as mist blows away
they live among us.

     Yom haZikaron, 5749

-------------
*Av again, and again
that set of questions
crude as a constellation:
    what got broken
    should I cry
    when can we stop
    what then
-----
         
Av Chamsin
there is no "causeless hatred"

l7

    Refs:  Chamsin -- hot dry air inversion with angry ions
           Av -- month in the dead of summer;
                   makes Tammuz (named after a Babylonian god of sorts
                   who shtick is dying of heat prostration
                   on an annual basis) look positively mellow
           "The Temple was destroyed because of causeless 
            hatred", says the Talmud.
-----
l1

after this evening's pleasant supper
I almost  believe I but imagined
that Vespasian, two millenia dead
will destroy us in less than 2 days.
    (Bet Zayit, 8 Av 1987 C.E.)

-------

.p
SERMONS ON SIN

*In his last public appearance in eretz  Israel before Yom Kippur
the famous Rabbi confessed his sin: 
"Once a poor crazy shlepper wanted to come home,
and for three days I couldn't make up my mind
to write El Al a rubber check.
-----

Encrypted Yom Kippur Sermon

and Lucifer from luce to fire
fell, some say, failing 
to --
      bend ideals to living -- 'fallibility', if I may;  or say that
not passion but virtue betrays us,
beguiles the monkey mind with dreams
of premature immortality;
so, petulantly waiting to glimpses of mankind's immaturity
would (parody godlike judge)
damn me, damn you
hasatan c'est nous.

N.B.:  Heb. ha = the; satan = adversary; falsely concretized in theChristian heresy.

-------------------
Lucifer Regrets

Bad luck it --
cosmic banana peel, as it were
some trivial albeit sophisticated snub
of the preposterous couple of slime and mud
most improperly carnal for Our Courts

'Our'

Surprisingly, one could not quite
with a flip of wing
or even flash of cape
rise, and go back, duly apologetic of course 

-----
After "The First Wedding in the World" (Joel Rosenberg)

warm golden light of afternoon....
and after, invevitably, they
oh --- "ate an apple" if you will
chill flat blues of night-fall
cold grey rainsquall

alone and afraid
felt desire arise as grace
  amazed that miracles continued
.a4
reborn innocent of need
in the pardes of each others' arms
they imagined everything forgiven

     tail of fire, head of light
     gracefully entwining the Tree of Life
     "Snake" dashed down crushed between heaven and dirt
     hissed "in pain may ye push out bair'n"
shocked awake she smashed back that painfully raised head
needing to wash and piss.      




Bruria on the 19th of the 18

& Essau too that night lay down
bellydown
and seemed to see
a ladder black in a lake
   one foot anchored on earth
to climb downward
becoming greater and greater
until he drown,
or ungrasp and gasping break through back to life
and at last lifting face
start again
very small. 

-----

*Pass Washington D.C.,; Collect 3 Billion Dollars....


who once ran down deer...
and EssauElvis Presley
grew grossH-bomb Teddy-bear
stewing and gulping pottageblood salt of the earth
compulsive denial BIRTHRIGHT
Israel may return, pleading:

(12/84)
----- 
"The greatest jihad..."*

mean man, Moses
some say, who
humbled own soul

so, to do mitzvot
bid habitual vices
and bargain yourself down.

     *"...is that which one fights against oneself."
                                     Prophet Muhammed
Ref:  Islamic? midrash about a painter who brought back a portrait ofMoses

--------------
.p
"Jolly good," said Moses,
"whom shall we send?"
 ...
"Yes, quite; but -- might
 We not find someone more --"
 ...
Quite; yet -- surely You, above all --
 ...
Yes, yes...well --

(detouring passers-by eyed askance
 an exiled prince, perhaps,
 from Africa, thrusting a shepherd's staff
 groundward while burning eyes leaped up
 and incomprensible words fell through distended lips)

     :  The Annunciation of Don Quixote

   Refs:  "of uncircumcised lips"  Exodus
          "for he had married a Cushite woman"  Numbers 12:1

----------
Reb Nachman on Minimum-wage Job Ops

Going to hell?  Give 'em the finger:
do one last mitzva
on the way down.

------------------
Fable in Two Tongues

The 'Schwatze Wolf'
becomes, by motzi shabbos
a prince of grace
bestows a blessing, and dies
planting his name.

"Mes roses, en avait volait mes roses!"
Terrified bete noir, alter ego
Yearning for 'La Belle'
"et les betes, les pauvres betes, ne peuvent que mourir"

(Summer, 1986:
Refs:  R. Shlomo Carlebach's retelling of 'The Schwarze Wolf'       Jean Cocteau, screenplay, "La Belle et La Bete"
       Plato's notion of 'The Beautiful', passim.)
----------------------------------------------------------------
.p

*The Meaning of Life according to Renata (1)

Sometimes in eternity
there's a draft call
and some souls have to go down to earth
for a little lifetime.

As below, so above --
you get all types in the army: 
  The wise old souls go to Iceland
	and when they grow up
	they go down to the bars stay there
	all the long winter
	until it's time to go home.
  They're retired, and dam' well gonna stay that way.

  The teenagers go to Israel
	where they make a lot of noise
	and have adolescent identity crises:
	"Who am I?" "Who's a Jew?" "Let's all be Palestinians!".

But nobody from Iceland
goes to Israel.

----   
.p
Lines written somewhere above Ein Gedi

Breaking a bunch of rules as usual
I'm slighly lost on the Judean Desert
sans map, hat, water, food, jacket, matches & sleep-sack
2.5 hrs daylight, 2  1200-foot trails somewhere thataway.
Unasked jeep stops, bani in back gives me
  2 oranges, 2 white-flour pitas
  and 1/3 bottle of water
  that tastes of her lipstick
until suppertime.


--------
.p
ATTEMPTED EULOGIES

Fragments for a Eulogy

flat river on a summer afternoon
sudden white water
dusk so soon?

-----

Death be reasonable
you've made your point
why can't we change the subject?
-----            
The Superjet Aeoroplane Corporation
efficiently whisked up all my luggage and me
but forgot my shadow.

-----

Subsequent bullets don't hurt, they say;
or Creely's Heraklitean
'rivers run -- islands wash away':
supposing my home sold
I find myself losing things
fatalistically.
     
     Ref:  R. Creely, Introduction to Islands
           and Heraklitus, the usual quote

-----
EULOGY.
   M.S.

Before I got around to getting back to visiting you
you had already lived and died.

   Vicky said
   "No one really understands the late quartets
except Marilyn.
Marilyn said
"you can't write like that.
She hummed a septuplet run by Schnable and said
"If I would play like that just once
I could retire."
----   
One's friends dispers,
that's all.
Some, others have, as I recall, told me
ddrifted quickly down the shadowed bend
amidst the clouds as
ideas?
Left in the sun, we grope along
whistling tunes in the wind.

