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A Decoration and A Poem

Beautiful Christmas tree decoration from Poland

Yesterday was International Human Rights Day and a friend sent me the following poem which moved me to tears.

Summer (’16)
BY RACHEL TZVIA BACK

The cyclamens have a hard time
breathing in July.

The sun ravages them and earth
is too dry.

Still, try remembering March light
and the tight

deep-buried bulbs that somehow
do not die.

2
The children are scattered
like weeds.

The children are scattered dust-colored
dirt-covered

like weeds. Mid-summer grey reigns,
and rain

exists not even in memory, here where children
dressed all

in debris peer out from under slabs of
jagged stones,

bombed homes, mountains or ruined
thrones

they may have climbed, small kings and
queens

of imagined realms, smoothest pebbles
in small palms their

caressed totems and favorite songs as they
would have climbed

here where now they half-buried lie, small bodies
crushed by pitched-black

weight, there they wait, to be pulled out from
under the remains

of broken town, mangled concrete, piled-up stones,
bones, dust clouds and

shrouds, on the children who are
scattered now

across the whole countryside
like weeds.

3
At the edge of another summer.
At the edge of a fallow field.
At the edge of day.

Waiting

For last light of dusk
To call all the children
Home.

A Note from the Editor
Today is International Human Rights Day.

2 Comments

Posted by mybeautfulthings on December 11, 2023 in Christmas, Christmas decorations, photography, poetry, Postaday 2023, Uncategorized

Tags: empathy, International Human Rights Day, RACHEL TZVIA BACK

The poet, Kim Ridgeon has written very movingly about isolation. Like me, he worries about those whose views, in isolation, are just bricks and graffiti, who have nowhere beautiful to walk and he expresses that so clearly. He feels he wants to do something, as we all do, and here he is, doing something – writing poems that touch our hearts and set us thinking. I thank Kim for the permission to share his poem with you here.

Our walk today took us across the railway line and along some lovely lanes with the gift of open skies. We are so very lucky.

I feel the same need to ‘do something’ and though I write for myself, my gift right now is being able to sew. I have made eleven scrub bags which will be collected tomorrow and sent to wherever they are needed. Although I am a political animal, I rarely show that here but I have very mixed feelings about being an amateur sewist doing my bit along with everyone else in the national movement to sew scrubs, caps and bags when our government has let the side down so very badly. NHS and other care workers are dying for lack of PPE. Clapping on Thursdays is good but proper funding over the last ten years would have been much better.