The Shape of My Sadness:
A Rosh HaShanah Reflection on 51 Weeks of An All New Kind of Agony
(The Old Guitarist, by Pablo Picasso, 1904)
Whenever I am plagued by feelings I cannot name, I write a poem.
Poetry gives me a way to take meaning out of my pain so that I may replace the empty and confused feeling of unprocessed woe with the somewhat more fulfilling feeling of anguished understanding.
Poetry brings me peace.
At the beginning of this year of agonies, around October 10th, I wrote a poem called “Psalm 10: Lonely is The Mountain.”
And, after some encouragement from friends and families, I decided to take it to a poetry reading.
It is one thing to write a poem; it is something else entirely to read it.
And, in early October, I could really have used the catharsis of reciting poetry.
So I went to Da Poetry Lounge, LA’s premier spot for spoken-word poetry, seeking comfort and community with my fellow poets.
But that is not what I found.
Early into the reading, a poet, stepped up to the microphone with a black marble composition book and began reading.
“The Police don’t,
Protect the People,
The Police protect property.
So If we’re going to, protect the people,
We need to fund the people,
Properly.”
As a poet, I loved his meter. I cannot hope to reproduce it here, but there was a recursiveness to his rhyming that I was very envious of.
But, of course, as is the end of all things, his poem included a long diatribe against Benjamin Netanyahu and the State of Israel.
“The Little Satan,” as he called it.
In October, my feelings were still so raw.
They are still so raw, but it is hard to even remember how painful those days were.
I got up and left.
After the greatest pain I had ever experienced, I had finally gotten up the strength to go out and engage with the world. I was stepping outside of my comfort zone to do something that should have been emotionally productive.
I was trying my best to cope.
And then I got punched in the face with the very thing I had been trying to cope with.
I was trapped, stuck between a rock and a hard place.
I could not go on social media to connect with fellow Jews, because social media had been overrun with antisemitism.
I could not go to a poetry reading to connect with fellow poets, because the literary world had been overrun with antisemitism.
I had nowhere left to turn.
Of all of the agonies we have suffered this year, of all of the anguish, I think the greatest has been the denial of our right to process our feelings.
It feels like the entire world is engaged in psychological warfare against the Jews.
Sometimes, I simply want to break down and cry at the thought of everything that we have lost this year, but I can’t – there is no time for tears.
There is no time for tears when the wolves are at the door and the world is falling into a struggle of all against all.
It has been 51 weeks since October 7th, and yet the Jewish people have not even had a day to mourn.
We have been fighting for our lives everyday since October 7th, and we will keep fighting like this for G-d knows how long.
And I am tired.
Like Jacob wrestling all night with the angel, this struggle seems endless.
I would be lying if I said that I did not often think of giving up.
I speak Spanish, I could move to a little village in Uruguay and watch a herd of cattle and write my love poems to G-d in peace.
(How nice does this dairy farm look? Not a Palestinian flag in sight. No one talking about American politics — just cows and mountains, mountains and cows.)
I could teach history in the local school, and no one would ever call me a dirty Zionist again.
I could do it, except that I can’t.
The fantasy of running away is perennial. The dream of starting over in a new place, in a new town, with a new name, has tremendous appeal to the human condition.
But there is nowhere left for the Jews to run.
I picked Uruguay as my fantasy destination because it has 3 million people and 10 million cows, and I feel much more comfortable with the politics of cows than I do with the politics of people.
But, when war comes, it comes for all.
As Jews, we have always, secretly or not so secretly, looked at Israel as the place of last resort. That, if all else fails, we can always move to Israel.
Now, we may still feel that way, but we are scared. We are scared that if we move to Israel we might get killed there along with everyone else.
But we do not want to be scared of that because, in many ways, we want to believe that G-d will always protect us and that G-d would not let us fall into a third exile.
For me, when these thoughts start running around in my head, it feels like they let the circus run wild in my brain.
I feel as though I am torn between the desire to sob and the desire to vomit, to somehow expel all of this anguish from inside of me.
To let it go.
But I have not been so lucky.
So instead, I keep going, trudging along, day after day, hour after hour, just trying to stay strong enough to keep on trudging for one more day, one more hour, one more minute, in the hopes that maybe, just maybe, one of these days it’ll break.
Until that day, though, let me say the obvious.
This sucks.
I mean this really fucking sucks.
I mean this is just like the absolute worst of the worst.
I wish I had more to say than that, but that is just it. This has been an awful year. We are all hoping next year will be better, but I think we are also preparing that it could very well be worse.
I will end this piece with a poem, since I do not know what else to do.
I am sorry that it has been such a painful year, for your sake and for mine, and I am wishing you all a very happy and healthy new year, filled with love and meaning, joy and Judaism, and some much needed peace.
I heard a great Sephardic saying, although I forget the Hebrew. But it goes like this:
“May the curses of this year leave swiftly, and may the blessings of the next come swifter.”
Shana Tova
And now, a poem for the new year.
Rosh Hashanah in the Year 5785
I live inside this well,
So I may hide my tears.
I’ve tried to be so strong and brave,
But oh, this year, of years.
It has brought me to my knees,
It has broke me to the bone,
It has torn me from my country,
It has left me all alone.
I have braved the choppy seas,
To charge the one-eyed monster,
But oh, Penelope!
How I miss the life that’s softer.
This year of twists and turns,
This year of ash and flame,
This year of shrouds and urns,
How canI come to pray?
How can I speak to G-d?
When this year has been so cursed,
Should I be hateful for this loss,
Or grateful it’s not worse?
Aveinu Malkeinu,
Our Father, Our King,
Bring peace to your people,
And hear how we sing.
Our hearts filled with anguish,
Our souls filled with pleas,
Our pain may you vanquish,
And bring us to peace.
Aveinu Malkeinu,
Our Father, Our King,
Bring peace to your people,
And hear how we sing.~
Spread Love, Spread Light,
Am Yisrael Chai