The dew of life
From the Garden of Eden
Pure and

Removed from
Muddy

From every worthless
Fear

From every weakening
Of the soul

– Rav Kook

What Color the Soul 2

I had seen a luminous blue
You mentioned
silver and rust –
I had assumed it was the same color
One color
I had seen when I descended into the
Being
of my Boy.

It was twenty years ago
And I see it now.

One color
One soul I thought –

But silver and
Rust
The color of yearning
Kesef silver
Kisoofim yearning

And ‘ergah
More yearning

So many words for
Yearning –

Unashamed and
Whole with
Yearning –

My own yearning
For one

Word

One soul.

jsg, usa

Between the narrows
The 17th of Tammuz
And the 9th of Av

Constriction
Opening onto –
What

Pinch Squeeze
And from the squeeze –
Surge

You open With
Expansiveness

Contract and expand
Constrict and Open

Breath pursed
Narrows Release

From constraint To expanse
Exile to Redemption

There is a hilltop in Jerusalem where heaven and earth touch. After the destruction the bride began to weep, the ground wept too. The bride returned as a bird perched at the wall.

For three summer weeks, I sat low in sadness. I planned to bleed, to wash myself clean.

This I have been taught: After a river of tears, expect the messiah.

On that day,” says Isaiah, “the great shofar will be sounded. And they will come, those lost in the land of Assyria and those forsaken in the land of Egypt, and bow before G*d on the Holy mountain, Jerusalem.” — Isaiah 27:13

jsg, from a mtn top in the Gallilee

Use the Strength of the Yetzer
For Rising
It is grown from
Compassion

Be gradual

Our goal –
The Highest

When will my deeds
Reach
The deeds of my
Fathers and Mothers?

Awakening strength
Little by little

The light in life
Will shine
Within

jsg, usa Rav Kook Groove
*Yetzer, the dark inclination

Master of all the Goods
Scattered as they are

The physical is demanding to be fixed First
A physical practice

We are full of blemishes
Skirmishes And wars

The treasure of life –
Holiness

Whose vision of existence
Is your purpose

Establish the world
And give it stature

The fallings are all necessary
Even when immersed in light

Shades and darknesses
All around

I am not afraid
The dark too –

A source of learning

jsg, after Rav Kook

The letters
Sprouted
Within thought

Lying like birds
Refined firmaments
Divine images

The analytical
Intellect
Absorbs them

Imagination
Shapes them
Feeling awakened

And the delight of Song –
And its waves.

jsg, usa after Rav Kook

We are moving over thresholds
the stories converge
they may not –

All of them may return to us someday —
[assist anyway]

Sustaining like the water
the well
the Wilderness.

jsg, usa

The smart ones knew about the
Chambers of the heart.

There is a life force
A point existing within –
The life force inside every living thing.

Attach to it
Glue yourself to this point –

When we meet
We are bonded.

I belong
to you –

You belong
to me.

jsg, usa

The Joy of the Mitzvah

I was sitting in the booth with
The truthful linguist
It was just after the turn of the Millenium

The truthful linguist
Stretched out in his chair
His hands folded over his belly

He was eating fish
Fish is a blessing, he said
He then talked about water

The early waters into which we pitch our sins
And the later waters when we draw them out
Those are the sins that become merits –

Transforming, he said to me
You know how that works,
don’t you?

The place where the turning one stands
The righteous cannot stand –
Yes, I said,

I do know how that works
But joy?
That’s elusive for me

Simchah is avodah, he said
You have to work it
It doesn’t fall out of the heavens for us

Then he began to sing until the hand of G*d came and rested upon him
We settled into our vessels and our vessels into our chairs
And our chairs descended into the earth

Later when we were finished
I pulled myself up by a strap of woven palm
Hung from the roof of the radiant booth

jsg, usa

Then I commended joyfulness [Kohelet 8:15],
this is the joy of the mitzvah. . .
as it is said, but now bring me a minstrel.
And it came to pass, when the minstrel played,
the hand of G*d came upon him [2 Kings 3:15] – BT, Shabbat 30b

O my dears

An interior picture in words and pictures we draw of your life as we live a prayer dedicated to your legacy; what endures.

Be a guide for us, for your family, be an angel for your loved ones as your loved ones were angels for you. Maybe you can send a sign — try something large –

or send another sort of sign something specifically you, send it over the divide
we’ll know it when we see it; we’ll recognize your style.

O my dear ones

We who joined you on your journey for a time in this life, mourning now your passing in the way life or God or nature or whatever it is we believe in writes our story.

Your goodness extends over the divide — more than memory — though memory is a blessing; we who survive you carry the lessons of your life in our lives,

We will have to live somewhat for you and for all the heroic co-travelers on our way, whose lives we know from the inside out.

And when you die we die some too, and when we live — you live some too.

jsg, usa