orange and Bermuda wine passage

photo  courtesy of Google

water bongos pulsate

dripping in Talmudic cadence,

yawning bugs with Hebrew accents daven and sway

as another path opens…

as another man’s beard whitens…

as another woman’s heart Goldens…

when a sea-weary wooden vessel

packed with 150 bleary souls

at last stumbled into Netanya that 1947 blue Shabbos night,

the orange and Bermuda wine passage was born,

dragging and tugging along

ghosts of generation after Yehudim generation.

deckhands and earnest wanderers

alongside destitute jokers aboard,

nonetheless endowed with hearts

that had remained solid,

beholden,

forever settled into their steadfast place

(for it is only our transitory heads that frolic,

leaping into miracles or creating dread).

this human cargo of lost and hopeful sailors

abandoned by any thought of love

 or empathy from the world,

members of those scattered distant 12 tribes converged,

dressed in blue…

dressed in white…

this singular race,

unabashedly poetic,

serene despite their struggled existence,

mindfully scraped away the rusted ruins of history

from each wet moment in time, digging,

competing for just a glimpse of some kindly refuge,

some inevitable brilliant corner of this land

soaked and tethered in lilting flute joy.

and here today makes 70 years subsequent…

let us remind our brethren

of these blue and white sailors

who had forsaken their bodies

and whose hearts long ago emerged

all nested in a shared place,

this spoonful of humanity having piloted as one,

still celebrating Life,

undauntedly,

 hand in hand,

pirates who once drifted like honey oozing

from a relentless tide,

who stood face to face against

fig wine anointed counterfeit rigid prophets,

foes who sanctimoniously knelt in self-righteous prayer,

who demanded surrender and compelled conformity,

and who honored only their monarchial princes,

and cannons,

and queens…

yes,

it is our calling

to stand with these blue and white sailors

who bestowed upon us

that orange and Bermuda wine passage,

who have been protected and honored since 

by further generations of curlyhaired steadfast sailors

who have carried on the will to sustain

the weight of decades,

centuries

millenniums,

trusted survivors who never wavered…

and so from them,

thus and at last,  

we are once again beckoned, harbored,

all of us-

homeward

June 21, 2018