She told her story today To the haters No it was really her mom's story And no they weren't really haters Only ignorant Uninformed They sang a hateful song At a soccer match They sang Jews burn the best And it hurt her so She wrote a letter About her story Mom's story In the camps They brought her with The haters in a bus To the camp And she told the story She didn't hate She didn't point Or call names Just told the story And they heard it They understood One came forward and said It was me I started it I sang the song And the others Came forward too She asked do you understand Better now And they nodded And they wanted To be her friend She did a mitzvah today When she told The story
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We travel for hours Sleep fitfully And stumble bleary eyed Out into the morning In a new country All seems slightly skewed A bit trippy From lack of sleep Disoriented by the Odd sounds of language We are soothed By a trip to The flower market Watch friends barter Negotiate and flirt Over fantastical bouquets Dinner a lovely pasta I can't get enough of And finally we have Stayed awake long enough And have earned the grand prize We can sleep at last We will wake up In this new land Refreshed and ready To take on The adventure Women in brightly colored scarves Intricate jackets Handmade bead necklaces Men dewey eyed with sincerity This is the best Expressive arts therapy program In the world They congratulated each other They cheered We enter into the experience Swaying chanting Crawling making animal sounds Forming drum circles Moaning squeaking Holding forced gaze And I burst out laughing As a grown man leapt Around being a baboon For this I paid $50? Wow She is grown A woman now Intelligent and accomplished Yet she cries when she says How much our work Meant for Shaping her Molding her into What she has become This is the reward For the trudging Days and years Just this one woman Makes it all Gone in a flash All the drudgery Disappears as the Shining tears Roll down her cheeks And she says thank you Is there a way to turn The dark hopelessness Turn it around Is there a grain of truth To be found in it Can the grain be nursed Nurtured tended One truth may contain beauty May lead to another And discovery of An idea could Point out another path Darkness does not have to Mean the end Does not always unearth Sorrow death misery Darkness can cover A pool of untold depth A new world Outside of our understanding If we keep looking Breathing deeply I unwind Gaze at and through The latticework of green Intertwined branches Lacy patterns of leaves Filter late afternoon sun To unfocused eye Blinks of movement emerge Glints of red brown grey Cardinal sparrow squirrel Go on with their lives Unconcerned with watchers The breeze too stirs Branches Forms new patterns overhead Peace comes quietly while I watch this busy world In the trees As unaware of me As I was of it Short hours ago An elite world clusters on The harbor Sumptuous suites Face the sparkling water They stack up to the Most precious at the top Of each building Like ornaments on a wedding cake Each one flaunts Two story ceilings Green roofs sun decks The streets below Are peopled by fast moving Men and women in suits Scurrying to pay for Their piece of the pie Each block removed has less Shine and glitter Until at the heart of the city Is the real life Real dirt real work Real people Working to clean it all up You get to an age People start getting Serious illness Start dying First one then another Before you notice You've got four on your short list To worry about What's next Start worrying about each other Worry about yourself About dying Seems someone Flipped a switch Instead of swirling lights Thousands of wrinkles appear Aches and pains abound Still given the alternative Life is pretty good I'd say Nobody wants to hear about Pretty things calm feelings A day that is ok Fine really That's like Mushroom soup from a can Gooey blah bland We want edge and spice Challenge us with rhymes Themes of horror Blood crime chaos But what if your life Is more like mushroom soup And less like flaming Lamborghini What if blah and bland Would be a relief from Blood and chaos If that really was your life What then When I get stuck in my head It seems like I'm having Such good ideas And I share with the world Before I think And things happen They get knocked over And fall apart Over sharing it's called Could I just sit on it Once in a while Maybe my ideas Aren't always what Others want to hear Maybe I could stay quiet And listen to someone else And maybe make that A regular habit |