Just a Poem (for Shemini?)

This week, I got nothin’.

At least I don’t think so—or didn’t.

This week is the week when Moses’ nephews are consumed by fire.

They have offered what has been translated as “alien fire” to God.

Their crime is initiating a sacrifice without God’s command or consent.

It’s a tragic story with little sense to its punishment—and no time to grieve.

Instead of a story of my own, I offer another poem by Mark Nepo:

Above and Below:

Before I could speak, I reached

for something shiny. And godlike

figures swooping in from nowhere

blew small winds in my ear.

Later my parents tried to tell me

there was no wind. It was our relatives

playing with me in my crib. But I know

better. For over the years I’ve been re-

arranged by movements of air. And kept

alive more than once by godlike things

swooping in from nowhere.

You see, things are always what they

seem and more. Like icebergs, above

and below. Like what we say. And what

happens to us. Like the ribbon of to-

morrow behind the winter trees this

instant. Just another day and the call

of all that is waiting out of view.

So when I chance upon an infant

I lean in close and close my eyes, let-

ting all the love I’ve known and dreamed

rise from the basin of my being. Until it

rounds the soft precipice of my mouth

and falls as a whisper that might

steer a life toward light when lost.

(From his book, The Way Under the Way)