Through Jewish Eyes

i.

Mama was modern and so
there was no braided
candle fire only

sunset flaming the fall
or winter sky each Saturday.
That’s my religion

Mama would say as if
anything less was pagan
worship, as if

it was somehow suspect
to see sunset
through Jewish eyes.

ii.

Moses said, I must turn
to look

at this marvel. Why
does this bush not burn up?

And when the Lord saw Moses
had stopped to look, He called

to him out of the bush.
Moses! Moses!

And Moses answered.
Here I am.

iii.

And here am I

in the quiet wood,
snow packed so I stand
a foot above

earth and do not sink.
Birds cry.
Virginal trees are naked

white as I hike in
unexpected sun, morning’s fog
lifted in a blue noon.

I seek bushes buried
under the ruins of storm
upon winter storm.

It is so calm.

Squirrels listen,
attend to bits of bark
brown-black and stark against

soiled boot prints I find
I can walk in and still find
my own way.

Barely covered, a log
laced in lichen
seems like some sort of

miracle, its contrast
of color splashed against
gray-beige trees.

I could not love
winter without these:
the cap of snow on a boulder

in this unexpectedly
flowing creek, the renewed
rattle of trolley, silenced

three days by impassable
track, finally back again.
Look. On the hillside.

A yellow plow lies
still and abandoned.
Look.

Water flows and every limb
holds its own golden thaw, while
above it all, the sun

lowers to red.
The whole world burns
around me, and is

not consumed.