Here in the Diaspora
 
​
When will the evening be over
and finally time to eat?
We’ve taken seats beneath the skylight
to be first to get the word.
But Daylight Savings the Yom Kippur sun
plays hide and seek behind low clouds
and still too high to lend much hope— 
We’ll go along, though wary of the rabbi’s trick:
Let’s chant Al Heyt once more.
Yes, we fear we’ve missed the mark— 
we admit and admit again— 
but we’re tired and hungry, so let’s 
put some sorrow aside for next year.
 
Now we check the western window
and finally some proof.
We see how God separates night from day
with great but subtle intention— 
we’ve known this mostly by reputation
since we forget most twilights to look— 
content to sip our soup, ignore the kids,
unfurl our latest designs,—a sin temporal enough
to earn immunity all days, but not today.
 
For all our earnest talk all day,
peace seems far too far from here and now.
Give us back the dailiness of As Is:
a piece of bread, a taste of wine,
the evening news droning our foreign war,
the sky above clogged with our filthy air.
We know three stars mark night from day,
but what if there are no more stars to see?
Here in the diaspora, why not three cars— 
the latest models--their headlights ablaze?
God knows our fate's been sealed by now;
we’ve seen what we were meant to see.