09/05/2024
I am excited to share with you another poem that will be featured in my upcoming book. This one is called "Self-Portrait with the Baal Shem Tov. I thank Michael Simms for publishing, too, in Vox Populi.
Let me fall if I must fall.
The one I will become
will catch me,
said the Baal Shem Tov.
You keep falling, but learn
nothing new. You land
in cold currents of regret,
sending shocks to your soul,
but it doesn’t awaken.
***
The Baal Shem Tov died on a sacred
holiday. His followers forbidden
to bury him, he buried himself:
Another selfless act
in a life of piety, while
you push yourself just
to pray in the morning—
Not stare at snow tumbling
down dark grey
Washington Heights sky—
And ask G-d to match you
with a woman whose lamp
does not go out at night.
***
If you lived in the time
of the Baal Shem Tov— wielder
of G-d’s hidden names—
you’d take a one-horse wagon
over Carpathian Foothills,
Ukraine’s hard, snowy roads,
hoping he’d bless you
with a family and the secrets
of the holy curves on Hebrew
letters to teach your children.
To read the rest, go to the link below:
https://voxpopulisphere.com/2024/08/25/baruch-november-self-portrait-with-the-baal-shem-tov/
