Even in a lifeless crag
Amidst a desert
Ragged rock
There’s proof of breath
Long gone
Still strong.
Fossil (Photo by A. Asif)
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Against All Odds
The Daily Post
Birth of Hope
“I didn’t think it was possible,” she said. Her hand hovered close over her heart, a tremor perhaps mirroring the flutter inside. “I never dared to even hope.”
A budding of something long buried illuminated her face, softened the crows’ feet around her eyes, smoothed a line of worry that had etched itself, preemptive and ever-wary, onto her forehead.
It’s been such a very long road.
“Can you believe it? At my age?” She shook her head, amazed.
She lowered herself to the couch and patted her own knee in self-comfort or maybe to convince herself that she was real and wasn’t dreaming.
Her voice whispered wonder. “He loved it. Bought it on the spot. My baby. My first sculpture, sold.”
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In Plain Sight
His face gave him away.
Guilt wrote itself into every centimeter of his little visage. It colored his cheeks cherry and turned his lips downwards and his eyes up and away. He pressed his lips together to prevent admission. Tucked his hands deep into his pockets, one fist bulging in a telltale sign of something hidden.
Or not so well hidden.
I raised an eyebrow, more amusement than ire.
“I didn’t take anything,” he blurted.
My eyebrow climbed along with a corner of my mouth.
The four-year-old’s eyes darted down his arm, eyes magnetized by a conflicted conscience. “I don’t have anything in my hand …”
“I see …” I noted.
His looked up at me in alarm and the cherries on his cheeks bloomed beet.
“But …?” he examined the opaque fabric of his pants before exclaiming in half-question, half-fact: “Oh, you have magic eyes!?”
His little chest sighed and he pulled his hand out, candy clutched in guilty fingers. “I … I didn’t take it. … Uh … I only did … um … can I have one?”
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The Line
Photo by: A. Barlev
They walk the line as morning comes
As new day draws its dawn,
They walk as night approaches close
And sunset sinks alone.
They walk the line of now and then
Of sand and rock, death, growth,
They walk as footsteps mark the soil
And press it deep with hope.
They walk where many walked before
With others not yet born,
They walk in dust of those who passed
Of stories told and torn.
They walk to sew new roads to life
Connections old as time,
They walk a line of young and old
Their hearts as close as mine.
For The Daily Post
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The Sounds In The Silence …
“Hello darkness,
My old friend,
I’ve come to talk to you again …”
The song plays incessantly in my head, sparked awake by the words of a pre-teen who shared her nighttime worries with me.
She finds it difficult to sleep. Her ears strain to pick up any errant sound: A car’s brakes, a slammed door, people’s voices, steps, a distant bark. She’s afraid they’ve come.
She’s been told she shouldn’t worry. She’s done nothing wrong. Yet there are those who hadn’t, and still had loved ones taken. And she’s not from here. Not really. Not from birth, anyway.
What if the rules change and she’s deemed “returnable”?
What if they keep her away from her parents, send her back to where she’d come from? What if she cannot find the words, if they not let her explain that she is finally, finally, home?
She lies in bed at night. Listening. Making and discarding plans. Fretting in the dark.
Maybe she’ll hide. But where? Someone at school said they sometimes have dogs. She loves dogs. Police dogs — beautiful and focused and proud — never used to scare her. They do now. At their handlers’ command, they can hunt her down. She’s seen it. On TV. In her mind. Now her dreams.
“I listen to the sounds in the silence,” she whispered, eyes bright. “And I wait. Even in my dreams, I listen … and I cry when they come.”
For The Daily Post
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Expectant
“My mommy have a baby in her tummy!” she announces even before her little feet clear the steps.
“How lovely!” I’ve known for a while, but delight never gets old.
“But the baby not coming out yet,” she clarifies soberly.
“Oh,” I match my tone to hers.
The girl nods sagely. “It not ready yet.”
“I see.”
She shrugs out of her coat and wriggles a bit as she lets me help her remove her snow boots. She pauses mid-wriggle. One socked foot liberated.
“Will mommy have to blow?”
“Blow?”
“Yeah,” the almost-four-year-old cocks her head with bewilderment at my lack of immediate understanding. “When the baby come out.”
I look up, slightly flustered. Someone did a tripe-knot on that other boot. Fort Knox.
She stares at me.
It is one of those times when I have a feeling that my hypothesis about her question is quite different than what she is actually asking about.
“What do you think?” I default to my when-in-doubt-return-the-question-to-the-kid.
She nods vigorously. “Yeah. Because when the baby finish cooking it going to be too hot.”
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I Mean It!
He plopped himself on the rug and pulled his sock on, tugging on the elastic till the fabric stretched to his knees. He gazed down at a bump. Scrunched his forehead, patted the bump down. It flattened but not all the way.
The furrows in his forehead grew. The bumpy bit was connected to the sock … like always … but something still seemed wrong.
He twisted his foot. Examined the sole. No bump there.
He pulled harder on the elastic. Re-examined. No change.
He shrugged.
Somehow when mommy or daddy did this, the sock looked different. No bump on the bottom. No bump on top.
He stood, took a step and stopped. Another step. Stopped.
The bump bunched. It felt funny when he walked.
He sat back down. Stared at his feet. Wiggled his toes.
It felt funny again. He bent his foot. No good.
Maybe the sock was broken.
He pulled it off.
Took a look.
The sock appeared completely normal now. Just like always.
He pursed his lips, pointed his toes into the sock and tried again.
The fabric bunched. A bump.
He moved his foot, paused, narrowed his eyes, and sighed. Tugged the sock off and held it between thumb and finger.
“Be good boy, Sock,” he admonished. “No more no-sense. I mean it!”
Photo by: agirlnamedpj.com
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Awake
- Atlantic Sunrise: Na’ama Yehuda
Be awake.
In the world. For the world.
Be aware.
Of the life that unfolds
On pinpoint.
Keep your eyes
Open.
And your heart
Soft.
Wake up all words
Of hope.
Even those
Packed away in tight bundles
And locked.
Be awake
To the air. To the light. To the rain.
As shimmer reflects
And compassion
Remains.
For The Daily Post
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Lush Life
May you live life lushly.
May new life, both the organized and the wonderfully wild,
Find purchase in your soul
To grow
And feed
Your whole.
Orly Fuchs Galchen @ Dalia, Feb 2017
This photo of contrasting verdurous fields is by my wonderfully talented childhood friend and artist Orly Fuchs Galchen. (We’ve known each other since 6th Grade!)
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Not This Way!
She doesn’t want the blue dress. She wants the red one, with the sparkles. Yes, from the laundry. Even dirty. Not wait for tomorrow. Today.
She doesn’t want socks. Her feet won’t be cold. Not even if its snowing. No socks. She doesn’t even like socks. Ever. Never. Not even the Minnie Mouse ones from Granny … well … she likes those “a little” … “sometimes” … but not today. She doesn’t like any socks today.
She doesn’t want a ponytail. Or pigtails. Pigtails are “stupid.” She wants braids. Four of them. No, not this way! She wants one big one “like Elsa” and three “baby ones.” Because.
She doesn’t want milk in her cereal. She wants chocolate milk. In a cup. With a straw. Not the green straw. The pink one. And three strawberries. Not four. Three. “Not that one. These ones.”
Her momma sighs.
“You are being difficult today.”
The girl gives a shrug, then a side glance. A giggle escapes.
The mom raises an eyebrow. She is not amused.
The child smiles enigmatically, twirls her four braids (one big like Elsa’s and three baby ones).
“So what’s this all about?” Mom asks, eyes narrowed but curious.
“It’s Ben’s fault.”
“Ben!?” The mother shakes her head. The older brother is ten-going-on-fifteen and goodness knows these two don’t always get along, but Ben had left for school before Miss Au Contraire here as much as opened an eye. “How can it be Ben’s fault?”
“Remember yesterday?” little eyebrow mirrors the parent’s, challenging. “Ben said I ‘such a terrible critic.’ So I’m practicing. To get better.”
pinterest.com/pin/339810734368459869/
For The Daily Post
Na'ama Yehuda 
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