On a private forum I sometimes frequent with friends from college, someone brought up the subject of poetry, and I remembered this one poet who I fell in love with eons ago named Daphne Gottlieb. Mind you her work can be a little ... colorful ... but her sentiments and style are just beautiful. I discovered her during my early college years, probably seven years ago, you guessed it right that she's Jewish. One of my favorite poems of hers is simple, poignant, and powerful. May it move you as much as it moves me.
the jewish atheist mother has her say
baby, there is no
god but
they'll kill you
for him.
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It kind of smacks you in the face and wakes you up, right? I also found this little treasure from 2008 on my old Livejournal (even when I had this blog, I still kept up the Livejournal for purposes of dreams and poems, so thank cheeses for that!).
This thrift store buy is the inspiration for the poem. |
the knickknack never used to sing before
the way it does now, with its big red bridges,
and the Bay in the background, but upon the
shelf the box still sits still, ever-so empty.
because memories were meant for the other,
one who said forever wasn't just a metaphor,
but now -- those words are distant and different.
so this little black lacquered vessel,
it is vexing me as i sip slumber slowly.
i could fill it with the words i whisper
between boy and girl normal when i'm wishing,
whisking myself away in fabricated fiction,
stories i dream, vast displays of affection,
figures intertwined in sheets, placing words like
"i love you" upon the earlobes of the other.
words that whip and twist likes wind through waves,
overflowing the little black box, sentiments seeping
into heart chambers, filling up the empty spaces,
making the small glossy bauble worth its weight in gold.