If There Were Words

Thoughts after seeing the UCLA anti-zionist encampment

(Photo taken by me at the UCLA rally on April 28th, 2024)

If there were words that could express my grief – 
I would use them. 

If there were candidates I could believe – 
I would choose them. 

I’m sure if there were chants I could repeat – 
I would abuse them. 

But I’ve been beaten, broken, and battered, 
By the Warriors of Peace. 

The Jewish heart was shattered,
By monsters in our homes, 
They terrorized our children, 
As they filmed it on their phones. 

And instead of space to grieve, 
And mourn the ones we lost,
There’s riots on our streets – 
The ones we can no longer cross. 

There’s encampments in our schools,
Near where the Jewish students live,
Of people chanting slogans, 
Like they did on the seventh. 

If there were words that I could say, 
That could explain how it feels, 
To be a Jew inside a world, 
That is deaf to our appeal. 

I’m sure that I would say them, 
Or, at least, I would try, 
To scream them at the world, 
So that they could hear me cry. 

But those words do not exist, 
No words could touch this grief, 
So instead I’m stuck with this, 
And my poems of belief.