The Elevator
The Elevator
The door opens
Once
Every 19 years
The elevator operator
Asks
With whom
Would you like to learn
Today?
Choose Bar Yochai
Or the prophet Elijah
Who taught the holy Ari
Or the holy Ari
Who learned with
Abraham Isaac and Jacob
Or Luzzatto the Italian
Who memorized all the teachings
Of the Ari
When Luzzatto was 14
Or the Baal Shem Tov
Who was tutored in secret
By other Baal Shems
Until he was 36
Or Miss Mill
The 4th grade teacher
Who taught respect
And to create
Out of sadness
From the holy Ari
Learn to read out
Foreheads
And hands
To know faces
Especially when they
Change
From the Baal Shem Tov
How to make sense –
And prescribe remedies
From Bar Yochai
How to occupy yourself
With the needs of others
How to be a good student
For your teachers
A good teacher
For your
Students
From the prophet Elijah
Learn Readiness
Eagerness
From Abraham
Isaac and Jacob
Learn to pray at different
Times of Day
Ask
To spend a time
With Harry
Who will teach again
To be enchanted
By everything
jsg
Cracked
O holy men and women of flesh and bone
If [Im] you follow my laws (Bechukotai)
Hkk the root
The kind of laws that are beyond nature so to speak
These are the laws of God
The consequences for not walking by them?
That’s the verb — walking — [Leviticus 26:3]
The consequences for not walking by them
Are worldly catastrophic
The rains will not fall in their seasons
The earth will crack
It will get hot everywhere
The poles will melt
And we may not be saved –
Because we violated the
Secret Hidden Contract
Between human being-li-ness
And God-li-ness
The world broke apart
And we had been warned.
But if we do
If [Im]
If we honor and walk and keep and protect
Then nature will respond with order
We will be grateful for keeping this mysterious law of God
Familiar to everyone on the planet
Though none of us can say just What
That law is.
We all know the world is Cracked
But we don’t know
Why.
Bechukotai
Maqam Saba or Nawa
Saba: D E half-flat F G flat
Nawa: C D E flat F sharp G
jsg, usa
Metaphor Regressing
The Metaphor is Regressing
The metaphor is regressible
into more general and more general principles
from application to principle
induction to deduction
myth to tenor,
referent of the referent,
Ani HaShem [I am the Name]
Concealed of the Concealed [Zohar]
Ayin (Nothing) –-
referent of the referent
regressing,
the most we can say about Something –-
is Nothing.
jsg, usa
Small alef; poetry Behar
Maqam Saba or Nawa
Saba: D E half-flat F G flat
Nawa: C D E flat F sharp G
Earned
Two Brothers
Two brothers, Moses and Aaron
Here comes Aaron with his robes
The billowing sleeves
Good words
I want.
But those afternoons with Moses –
Hunched over a cup of coffee at the diner
I need.
Small alef; poetry Emor 2
Maqam Sigah
E half-flat F G
Every portion has a maqam
musical figure from the Arabic
cognate in Hebrew
Maqom – Place
Holy Priest-Man
O Holy Priest-Man
O holy Kohanim
Priest-men of the old Temple
For he is holy to God [Lev.21:7]
Father to son
Ki kadosh hu
Because he is holy to his G*d.
Next verse
You shall make him holy [21:8]
Who is you?
Priest-man is holy because he serves –
He has earned his holiness cred
By serving you.
Small alef; poetry Emor 1
Maqam Sigah
E half-flat F G
Every portion has a maqam
musical figure
from the Arabic
cognate in Hebrew
Maqom – Place
Get Real pt. 3
Don’t Hate and Don’t Carry
Rabbi Akiva told me
this is a major rule in the Torah –
love your friend as [you love]
yourself [Lev.19:18]
Look to the context –
the verse before:
you shall not hate your brother in your heart
you shall surely rebuke your neighbor
and not carry sin because of him [Lev.19:17].
Unusual progression
you shall not hate your brother to
you shall surely rebuke your neighbor
not carry sin because of your neighbor
to: love.
Only love has that kind of power
to heal.
We don’t lead with love
but we come to love,
we have moved through
don’t hate
surely rebuke
don’t carry someone else’s sin
don’t take vengeance
don’t bear a grudge
only
love –
I am Hashem
the way of love
the true healing.
jsg, usa
Small alef; poetry Kedoshim 3
Maqam Saba
D E half-flat F G flat
Be Real pt. 2
Major Rule
Rabbi Akiva told me
this is a major rule in the Torah –
love your friend as [you love]
yourself [Lev.19:18]
Re’acha – your friend –
it’s a close relation.
And there’s an extra lamed attached to re’acha
le-re’acha
we expected et the common call to the accusative
Ramban told me it was exaggerated language [haflaga]
impossible to love someone else as you love
yourself –
be real.
jsg, usa
Small alef; poetry Kedoshim 2
