Reflections at a time of war

I led davvening last Shabbat Re'eh 8/23/14 and for the alternative musaf  I responded to the ongoing conflict in Israel/Gaza (now fortunately having a ceasefire.) 

I shared two poems. One "Sukkot 2001" by Julie Pelc  was written shortly after the 9/11 attacks.  (This poem is in the URJ Women's Torah Commentary on page.1140)

The second poem is one that I wrote during the Yom Kippur war,  "GiveYourself Up Not."

I re-discovered it in a box a week or two ago.   After services, a number of people responded positively and said they would like to see a copy.

I concluded the alternative musaf with Mosh Ben-Ari's song, "Od yavo shalom aleinu...salam...."

Bob
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Give Yourself Up Not

          (for my friends in Israel: Malka, David, Marlene, Peggy, Michael, Judy—October, 1973)

When the hours of insanity

intrude upon

and shatter the day of introspection

and unholy convoys

again roll

through the rocky hillsides,

carefully cultivated valleys

and wilderness sands,

give yourself up not

to the maelstroms of destructions.

When the land

teems with the tense pressure

of absent faces,

of uncertain radio announcements

of yet another death

give yourself up not

to the passions of certainty.

When the work in tomato fields

or hospital corridors

gathers you up

in its daily currents

leaving exhaustion

and solidarity,

give yourself up not

to unanswered self doubts

clouded pictures of hindsight

or blacked out windows of fear.

And when the gunfire

once again slackens

and dirty teenagers

whose nostrils have smelled

things one would wish on no one

again frequent King George and Dizengoff,

when the last new graves

on Har Herzl are closed

and some semblance of normality

(hastily assembled)

returns again to Jerusalem and Rosh Pina

to Damascus and Port Sa’id

give yourself not up

to once secure illusions,

but give up not

your quest for peace,

your longing for justice

for you and your cousins,

your vision of a tomorrow

and your duty

--perhaps a bit like Yirmiyahu—

to speak words

(that lead to deeds)

that others may not wish to hear.

--Bob Tabak

Written during the 1973 Yom Kippur War by Bob Tabak, then a young rabbinical student,  thinking of his friends in Israel.  This poem was published twice: one in the Reconstructionist journal late in 1973 and about a year later in the Philadelphia Jewish Exponent (Oct. 25, 1974).