Clutch, child,
Clutch with your diminishing strength,
Clutch with your breakable nails,
Clutch to your chest.

Clutch, child, hold it tight,
Before the nostalgia comes
And removes it from your sight.

Clutch the times, clutch the places,
Clutch Mother Gooses's wings,
Clutch Daddy knowing everything.

Clutch for dear life, your innocence,
Clutch all the things you've not yet given.

Clutch to your sweet heart
Whilst it's not yet tasted bitterness,
Clutch to your soul, dear,
Before it turns to heresy.

Clutch bright- eyed sincerity,
Clutch skinned knees and easy remedies,
And for the life of us, child, clutch me.

Je suis votre reine,
et vous savez que je t'aime.
C'est la raison pour laquelle je vous poignarde
avec des mots  meurtrières dans une belle langue.
Je suis une reine,
J'aime vous montrer le royaume- qui est votre frère.
Parfois, je le partage,
et parfois j'aime régner avec une poigne de fer
et le ramener sur votre cou.
Je suis une reine,
aussi ridicule que Antoinnete.
Je suis une reine
qui est menacée par sa princesse.

There is a bubble shooting out of my hand,
And it's made of plastic hurt and loathing,
And it's as see- through as I am,
And it grows and grows and covers you,
All of you, and your loudness, your rudeness, your obnoxiousness,
Your stinky cloud of perfume and ridiculous eyeliner,
And your burnt hair and bitchiness and stupidity,
And now you're inside of it,
And it's shrinking and shrinking and making you as small as you seem,
The size of your brain,
And you're tiny next to me.

I see a spark
In my mind's eye;
The spark melds two
And once lit never goes away.

A spark so bright it leaves no choice
Or room to roam love's other corridors,
Its magnetic pull sufficient
To never want to let it die.

I see a spark,
Just in my mind;
That I think I once saw with my eyes,
And now I think that I've lost sight.

I see a spark with someone new,
Illusion or delusion of grandeur?
Make new friends? Keep the old?
Prospecting when I've found the gold?

You think you're the better writer with
         Your indentations,
Arrogant alliteration,
Games of Rhymation;
When You Capitalize For No Good Reason
OR TYPE IN ALL CAPS;
When you type in italic just because you can;
With thy ineffectual employment of Shakespearean formulation
Or elongated conveyance of your articulation,
                                        When you type in
                                             funny patterns to
                                        better express the  
                                             thoughtfulness and
                                        superiority behind the gemstone
                                                   artist,
And, all- your; meaningful, strategically placed' punctuation!
And perpisfuly mispled wurds bcuz yur so ironic,
And your cryptic title that's meant to come off as genius.
Dylan could crack a skull without a hammer.

It's raining and it's freezing
And the wind sounds like it's weeping
And I'm all alone here hearing it pour.

The trees are tired, the world is weary,
Even the black clouds sound a tad bit teary,
And if they didn't let it out they might explode.

And I'm curled up and my nails are bleeding,
Because a biter can never quit cold turkey,
And I'm cold and feeling fat and so alone.

And babe, I've got these thoughts spinning in my brain,
Like the hail and the rain on my window pane,
And I'm wondering what anyone thinks that I'm around for.

And I'm talking to your friend, who's a sympathetic ear,
And I tell him I'm not sure what's going on around here,
And I'm confused and doubting what I mean to you.

If you love me, shut up and show me,
Knowing my family doesn't mean you know me,
And it's raining in this town tonight,

And in my room, and in my heart a little bit,
And I sit here alone watching Frozen while it pours
And the tears not shed feel solid and I
Feel
Cold.

I'm not in love with him;
I'm in love with the idea of him.
But I still feel guilty when he texts.

Don't chase the ghost
That walks these hallowed halls--
She seeks a change.

She embarks on a quest
To leave and start all over again.

My name is Batya,
Beth was a freshman's frustration.
Let me make my own introductions--
I'm graduating names.

The wrong eyes
Ignited
Butterflies.

A stolen caress
Disguised,
Denied.

Self- destroying words
Thought; scrawling,
Doubling, dying.

A love poem
Pens itself,
Redirection in desperation.

Because--

The wrong eyes
Ignited
Butterflies
Last night.

This week,
It's all about you.
This month, too.
This week,
He's going to forget about
All the things he says
He never got to do,
And everyone else will
Forget their gossip, too.
This week,
You're the man.
You're a superstar,
With pretty pictures everywhere
And candles drip and shine.
This week,
You're the title, hero, punchline.
Everything you were and never got to be,
Everything you prayed for till the end,
Making you even harder to bury,
Those are the things we'll talk about
This week.

I'm not sick,
Love is.
With it's cruel tricks
And double vision.

Love is one- way,
A mirror maze,
It takes your mind
To a point of no return.

Love is pain
Painted pink;
Killing chemicals
Enter your bloodstream.

Love likes triangles,
Scattering ice cracks;
Master of illusions
And puppets.

I'm not lovesick--
Love is.

Give it back,
From New York to Los Angeles.
It's conquered land.
Move embassies from DC to Texas--
It's not a capital just because it hosts your parliament.
Open your jailgates,
Set free those pacifists oppressed by your terrorist democracy.
Take a seat with a target on its back and cameras trained,
Pander to the ones with ready aim
While we count coins to pay for good behavior.

If you're in His image,
Then I am too,
And I am not a lesser man
(Or maybe I am).

I doubt His image has a head
To tonsure or to cover as seen fit;
It is, in fact, invisible,
Seen only in faces as reflected.

If I'm in His image, I imagine
Material immodesty is nonexistent--
For if not applicable to you in sight of Him,
I doubt His view of me is very different.

If I'm not in His image, then neither are you,
And every blessing you make is a blessing to rue.
The word is holy, if not your definition of manly;
And if I can't fulfill your obligation you never will, surely.

If I'm in His image,
Then beg my forgiveness.
If I'm in His image,
Then mind your own business.
And if I'm not,
Then neither are you.

Winged eyes
Flutter, take flight,
Little butterflies,
Shadow and light.

Mini kaleidoscope,
Can't focus on both;
Prisms, reflections,
Creatures making connections.

Liquid emotion,
Lie detection,
Deceit and love,
Model hearts.

In each-- black holes, perhaps,
Vacuum the world;
Others' merely wander through  it
Under a cover of night.

I like the way his voice snags on itself
when he's tired.

He sees the world in shades of green and brown and blue,
tinted through the eyes he sees it through.

He thinks, but can't put into words--
I like that I'm his self- expression, and
when there's an overflow of mine,
I like that I don't need to write them down for him to read them on my face.

It's a little lonely and a little nice
that I only feel like me when he looks at me,
and I like that he's looking right through what I see.

I like that he'll never, ever have had a broken heart
and I like that he glued shut the cracks in mine,
making it his creation, to know and feel at will.

I like that our color is white, the color of angel wings,
that things that would be dark if done with anyone else
are real because we're us, are pure, are holy.

There is a spectrum of emotion wider than the world
and only he could make me run that length in a day,
and sometimes I like that, and sometimes I lie and say I don't.

Yin and yang, like sun on waves,
with fights on the dark side of the moon,
with souls two big for one person to contain,
that's why we share them-- so there are two.

He wasn't anything.
He wasn't white.
He wasn't black
Or brown
Or peach
Or tangerine.
He could have been green.
Was he Asian?
Middle Eastern?
Did he wear a kippah,
A keffiyeh?

He wasn't anything.
I bet he didn't even
Have a belly button.
He came before the race.
He was nothing,
He was
earth.

Shadows lie across the moon lit
Silver dust that shapes our dreams
And darkness moves like waterfalls,
Making nothing what it seems,

The sparkle in my eye like diamonds
Or light on water, black and white,
Beauty unveiled delicately,
I'm moved to flight, maybe I might.

This is a teardrop world
Shed from an eye that can behold
Beauty before it's born, imagination
Before it rustles gentle wings and they unfold.

A dome of sky is within reach,
Dark space and twinkling stars,
Horizons so close I cannot see them
Before the glassy planet shards.

This is the place behind my eyes,
My afterworld, my peace,
This is the place I've not yet shown you,
Perhaps I will, just in my dreams...

Prayer is a thought,
                a frisson,
                 a song,
                 a sob.

Prayer can be all that one is,
All that one aspires to be,
It can be all that one has lost,
The last thing that one has to give.

True prayer is internal,
Prayer is like a snowflake,
Prayer is not printed
Words on a page.

Prayer is not always cathartic.
Prayer is angry. Prayer is hopelessness.
Prayer is more often than not
A last resort born of desperation.

Prayer uttered daily, commanded by a man,
Is prayer stripped of meaning, desecrated,
A holy word on a holy plane
Made mundane.

When a wild spirit falls in love,
It locks her up
In a cage.

When a wild spirit falls in love,
She gives all her wild away.

A wild spirit falls in simultaneous love
For boredom does not come easily
To a wild thing.

A wild spirit is a match only for multiple men,
And so she challenges herself and ends up tangled
In a web that can only be woven by a wild spirit in love.

Tan,
Not too big,
Not perfectly slim,
My suitcase has a rainbow- colored ribbon.

My suitcase is pretty,
It's delicate, crafted carefully,
Blemished and recalling antiquity.

My suitcase has faded stickers on it,
Dirt and stains and scars,
My suitcase is clearly well- traveled,
Adding to its charm.
The moment I saw my suitcase
I knew it'd be my friend,
And its handle felt like a mold
Of my small, custom- made hand.

Pain etched on a face
Clear, simple and dark as her days,
A mirror of sunshine
Breaks as a smile,
Breaks like a wave,
Breaks like the hope
That I imagine is her God.

Not the one inflicted on her body,
The one justifying
The bruises on her skin and heart,
The one in whose ghastly name
She conveniently suffers.

He is not the One, love,
Come with us,
We will carry you on our backs,
You will grow wings in time,
Your pain will heal.
Let me show you the One I know above,
I will show you that prayer is not a belt,
I will teach you to sing praises
Instead of agonies,
I will show you faith,
For I was allowed to stray
In order to discover
What is lost upon your captor.

Oh, how I longed to speak out,
To wear my immodest denim pants,
To sing with my seductive female voice,
To hug his little boy,
Oh, how I longed to throw in his face
That curse which he did make
By use of my Lord's name
In frightful vain,
And then I understood that if
I,
A guest, one who could not be beat
Into compliance,
Do not dare to speak,
Then your rescue must be up to me.
For while strong and proud, poor lovely one,
You will not break your chains
And run away.

Back home
I shower
And my eyes
Don't blink as they're lined
Along with my mouth
And usually I don't do that
But some lines on my face need to be redefined
Like the ocean eroded them
Just washed them away
And I'm dressed in blue and green
And in my ears are pearls--
Because I'm not afraid of the sea,
It was my fault it almost killed me
And the person I hold dearest.

I'd never thought in terms of luck
Until what was given to my peer
Was taken hastily from me.
I prayed for its return,
Upon which, once more, I proved unworthy,
For something better did escape me once again.
I freely sin, perhaps I'm shameless;
Alone in my willing, human ways.
I wish for darkness, with which to sweeten
The taste of the bitterness I bleed instead of grace.
Redemption's the word, but it's a roller coaster,
So to echo words of chosen ghosts
When perfection eludes me and I must beg for something more,
With my prayers answered, but my fingertips still beneath the stars--
True, he struck the rock,
And water gushed out,
Streams flowed abundantly,
But can he also give us bread?

This soul you gave
Has lost its way.
It doesn't know who made
It anymore.

Hashem, this soul
Instead of purified
Is petrified,
And heavy and full.

This soul in me's got
A little identity crisis,
With matter and anger tugging war
With rightness.

Perhaps this soul
Is mean, unfaithful.
Created divine, it still can't find
The innocence to make it grateful.

This soul needs help to find it's way,
Restorer of essence to body from sleep,
Return essence to that godly piece,
Allow your presence within me to keep.

Don't let me scare you.
I'm an ant beside a tree,
And if you don't recognize
The look in my eyes,
It's because you're used
To seeing me happy.
All the words engraved
In pencil on my bedroom wall,
Glittering silver
In every corner of my room,
My mind's forgotten how to read,
How to understand the things
Known previously, effortlessly.
I've become the paint,
Flaking off the wall;
The paper plane
That didn't quite take off;
The dog chasing its own tail,
Too innocent to ever give it up.
I've become the initials in your locker,
Alien, but familiar with age;
The poem on the internet,
The rebel stupid sage.
But I'm also all the things that never change,
You know my face, my handwriting, my name,
And you know my lifeline
Better than yourself--
So don't let me scare you.

All who have felt pain know mercy,
Even the Devil burns in his own fire,
Merely averting from suffering a sympathetic eye.

All who have been victimized
Know well that pity is spared
Only for the lowest of the persecuted.

All who love their neighbors
Equally and as themselves
Seldom feel anything at all.

None have lived to understand
Anything, but the judgments passed
On other souls besides ourselves.

None have seen His face,
Prophesied into near- tangible form;
Describe it if you can.

Our Days of Judgment
Come and pass through ages,
This we know for certain.

We know that we feel and think
And teach what it is in our nature to discover,
For believed truths cannot be false.

We float as specks through time and space
And know nothing but our pains,
But preach these truths as they appear.

So say I, simply,
As a dreamer,
For I'm but a mere creation,

I see my people weeping, and I don't claim
Superior knowledge, but it seems to me
That we are not just collateral damage.

Not many
Things make me
Crazy--
Chauvinism, and my family.

I think
We dream
Our lives
Before
We live them.

You,
her,
him,
they,
God, the weather;
hell, not me.

It will happen in a moment
But I expect it will feel like a century,
And his sense of time will obviously be innacurate
And he will know that and so
He will stop trusting all of his other senses
(His eyes did not see the doctor's expression
And the way he approached;
He did not feel the hugs of the surrounding people
That crashed down on him like waves;
And his ears did not hear the final blow,
The final breath.)
And he will go into denial.
I will be battling my own shock
And trying to pick up his pieces and grieving.
Only he knows me well enough to know if
I will deny his denial, but then again
Maybe the shock I feel at the words spilling
Like blood from my pen has prepared me.

All your life, you've wished for wings
While I've learned the notes the ocean sings.
To stroke the sky where it hugs the shore,
To ask the waves if we've met before.
You took your first flight as I was learning to float,
You build yourself a catapult, I dug myself a moat.
Both our hearts are equally blue,
And neither one has learned to hide.
Like lovers' eyes, you're lost inside-
Intoxicating, infinite, new.
We'll gallop together on common ground,
Sea horses with eagles true love have found.
No wind nowhere, dear, ever behaves,
The sky weeps tears and the sea laughs waves.

Where sky meets sea at the end of the world,
Where they kiss and intertwine to the beat of their song,
With the sun as a lone fiery partition,
That's where we belong.

After all, one turns to the beginning.
What questions should be asked?
Can answers truly have no meaning?
A person bleeding tears will end up dry,
Indifference and uncaring masked;
That is the price paid by those who cry.

Some children never grow,
Born in fear and blood and hate.
Still, some profess to know
The secrets that God didn't even make,
Horrors even He did not create--
Such as hearts that will never bend or break.

Clumsy as words, I dared approach,
And over the edge I bent.
A sight unexpected appeared to me
And reeling back with a gasp I was sent.

I gathered my senses, gazed brave as I might,
And the water within shone a shimmering light,
And reflected the white of a man's final night,
Penetrating the darkness of his final fight.

Weary from a sorrowful walk in the woods on a whim,
And the madness and heartbreaking sadness within,
I had long kept a silence, and my heart was burdened,
And so I greeted thought foe as a friend:

Exclaiming, I realized that no hunt, but a chase had taken place,
That instead I had followed dear death, and I wept.
'Twas then that I opened my mouth in prayer
And then I closed my eyes and I leapt.

I.                I am a lizard
    I tread the earth like lightning
           Grass sways above me
      
II.             I belong to Earth
       My beady eyes are small seeds
                My tail is a blade

III.       My cousins shed skin
           I am content in the grass
                   I am the lizard

I have rebuilt the temple.
I sense its arches supporting my weight,
Grace and power surging through my core.
I have rebuilt the temple,
A holy of holies resides in my soul,
A place of prayer as it unfolds--
I pray for Him to lend me sight through open ears.
I have rebuilt the temple,
Reignited each sacrifice of old--
No longer severed grace gone to waste,
No longer inside me a contradiction of faiths,
Freedom and beauty rise now from my flames.
I have rebuilt the temple,
Though its shell still stands--
A strip of land,
Desolate and serene.
I have rebuilt the temple,
For it had to be burned,
It had to be cleansed,
It had to be purged.
Its gold's destiny was to ignite
And it indeed was set alight,
Its flames, long extinguished,
Consume my mind in fright.
I rebuilt the temple,
Its sacrifices' horns stood sentinel,
While we awaited their blast
And paid cold cash in exchange for soiled souls.
I have rebuilt the temple,
Adorning it with bands of faith
And simple beauty and lights with which
To guide in sunny nights.
I have rebuilt the temple,
I break bread in its empty halls
And drink immortal wine
And answer the angel when he calls,
In the midst of his eternal watch
Over a box of long- forgotten treasures.
We have rebuilt our temples,
Woman to woman, keep my words,
Let none flow from your lips
To reach undeserving ears,
For a woman's wisdom is her might.
I have rebuilt this temple in my heart,
Its incense fills the corners of my soul,
The holy altar stands ***** within my mind,
And when I die it still will stand and does forever glory.

I've never seen a shooting star.
The city lights are way too bright,
But should they dim somehow,
I'll wish for words to never fail.

He said he'd take me out to see
A shooting star this summer,
And when he doubtless keeps his word,
I'll wish him peace of mind.

They've just finished telling me
About how they think that a person
Should only be considered an immigrant
(Academically) for her first five years instead
Of the ten that I said I wish were twenty, and they
Manipulate my words the time that I made the mistake
Of telling them that I feel like my personality belongs, and
I turn around and blink and swallow hard and the teacher hands
Out our new textbooks and through my blurry eyes I write my name
Inside the cover and I look down and I rush out of the room to write this when
I realize that I've written my full, god- given name beautifully, neatly-- in English.

We wait at the same stop.
It's pouring, and we join the huddle of people
Keeping dry under the cold metal.
I expect her to get on one of the Arab bus lines,
Because she's an Arab.
That was racist and I smile to myself when
She gets on the 74 with me.
We end up jammed in the middle, standing face to face
In a sea of human waves, getting on, off, hustling.
There is an Ethiopian lady next to us with a baby strapped to her back.
I think the girl is wistful. I wonder if she's wondering about her future, like me.
Her makeup is better done than mine is and she looks sad.
I wonder what secrets lie beneath her elegantly obscured body.
I remember when I was Orthodox- we were parallel lines.
I sneak a look at her hijab. I wonder if she looks at my hair.
I notice two rings, a diamond and a gold, on her left hand.
She follows my gaze, twitches her fingers nervously and moves her hand.
I wonder how he treats her. Is she afraid of him? Is she sad?
She looks sad. I want to ask her what's wrong.
Does she speak Hebrew? Maybe. Probably not. Maybe.
I want to at least meet her eyes and smile,
So she knows someone noticed,
But my eyes flit and dart away every time I try,
And all I can see is the hate that's been wedged between us since the 20's.
She can't be much older than me, I think as she takes out an Iphone
In a bright pink case, a twin to the one I'd checked in its turquoise case
About 30 seconds ago. We get off at the same stop.
She waits for a transfer and I start walking to school.
I will never see her again, but I hope that maybe our future daughters
Will be able to smile at each other on a crowded bus, and maybe even be friends.

Words
can fill a cavity
with layer upon layer
of quiet lies,
perhaps tears,
perhaps

Words can numb
enough to breathe
alone

in the dark
or the light

it doesn't really matter to
Words

and I still wonder
sometimes
if perhaps
Words work?

Where do the soap suds go
when they're washed down the drain?
Do they take the dirt and salty sweat
down to the sewers, where they won't be missed?

Once part of me, my veins and tear ducts,
there came a time for us to part, my dirt and I,
so the lathery angels kissed my ***** skin
and purified in instants a sad story of filth.

They wash away in streams of white-
ashes from car exhaust and cigarette butts,
and lines of black, like lung cancer and smeared makeup
and runny lines penned by an unclean hand.

I wonder, where do the soap suds go?
Do they toss my sins to the sea to be sunk
and forsaken, like how they came to cling to me?
Am I truly clean, or must the soap suds scrub my soul?

To a child, or a god- fearing man,
Responsibility is undue.
He has no life span,
And all wishes made-- come true.

A child learns the way
Of his father and his priest,
Then the man lives in decay--
That which feeds on fear to speak.

Thin air whispers in their ear-- prophecy;
For better, or maybe even for worse,
A king of men must bend his knee
Lest all bad fortune be a curse.

By the sight of a child, or a god- fearing man,
Black shadows lie in sharp relief.
By mine, though little do I understand,
Knowledge will forever trump belief.

Buzzing in my fluffy socks,
Skipping through school in my PJ pants,
Being locked up in a cozy box.
Beaming, grumbling about the ****** weather,
Pink becomes my color, and I look best when
Dripping, and grinning from ear to ear.
"*******, it got my shoes!"
Rain, Rain, come to stay,
And if I ever have a kid, maybe I'll name him for you.

It will be a gentleman's agreement
and a lady's choice.
There will be secrets whispered
and riddles that night;
no knees will bend,
and only silver tears will be shed.
There will be a sparkling rock
and it will witness this
from two billion miles away.
In the dark of a mid- August night,
the world will breathe for us.
Words will be too loud
and love will be too sweet.
We'll balance, existing,
like we've known nothing but simply being.
There will be no questions,
no need for answers;
there will be no time forever.

Teach me all the history you like,
Tell me how the greats have all fallen.
Take me there-- to the battle sites,
Touch the pages when you hear them calling.

Rifle through the dusty, age- old tomes,
Read about heroes long forgotten;
Reach for naught but shelves of yellowed books,
Reel years back from the ones that you were caught in.

I shall speak just truths learned from the past,
I'll heed the sounds of silence echoed through the ages;
I'll sound a spring born anew at last,
And slice the sobbing, seared, scarred, sorry pages.

I shall listen when you whisper tales retold,
I shall learn from wasted voices, still unheard.
I shall love for as long as histories unfold
And live as long as the last pages are assured.

I conquered the giant once.
Was that not enough?

People ask me,
"Were you born here?"
And I want to say I was,
But this slight of my tongue,
This twist of speech betrays me.
A native loved one tells me,
When he sees the consternation
And despair plain on my face,
That it's only a lilt, not crippling, per se.
But how do I belong here
If I speak with the voice of there?
How do I pause the motion of this accursed pen
And set it scribbling instead from  right to left?
I laugh with them when they hear the way I say a word
And I try to say it the way that they do,
But my "ah"s are too drawn, my "l"s too conspicuous,
My "r"s are not deep enough, my "t"s are too reptilian,
Slippery like the tears I'd shed when they told me
I was writing my name wrong.
I knew no other place, and here I learned to hate,
But lately, for the past 5 years or so,
I've been ashamed of the thing that brands me-
אמריקאית, Amerika'it, American.