In Hebrew you say that
you talk "in" the phone, not "on" the phone
prepositions aren't international

I worked with Ari and Zohar at the cat shelter
in the afternoon shift
Ari lost his job at the cement plant
after twenty years
There are no trees so cement makes everything
cement is your house, your floor
your city
Now he worked for minimum wage
Thirteen sheckels an hour for a few hours
in the afternoon

Zohar was a law student
with a passion for animals
"they must all be Americans," my American friend sniffed
when I told her of this group
dedicated to the welfare of Haifa's cats
No one was American but me

We worked near the Kryote on the road to Tel Aviv, the Haifa
Soccer team sped past our dilapidated
caravans on a dirt road to their practice field
I always worried they would squish a kitten

Near a boarding school for agriculture
and a cell phone tower spewing out cancerous radar
I loved working there

I cleaned, then washed at least 25 cat boxes
with a hose with no hot water hooked up to an old bathtub
outside.
Palm leaves strung up
for shade above me
gave some medications
the afternoon shift
at four, we politely sat down to instant coffee
(water boiled in an electric ***, a koom koom
the only way to make it warm here)
and chocolate
and cigarettes
Always cigarettes

I didn't know where my husband was
one morning, he had taken the car
so I couldn't keep going to this place or anywhere else
I think he was living with his new girlfriend
a former student of his, in Hadar
Hadar means beautiful
It was the cheapest place to live in Haifa

I took the bus, and if I had the money
a second

If no money for a second, I'd walk past the military base then
through the banana groves
taking my first shaky steps to independence
wind through the leaves so soothing
Lost in giant waving leaves
they seemed to embrace me
wave to me, cheer me on
like bystanders at a marathon.
Plants living their silent lives so peacefully,
apart from the hot struggles of humans,
through dirt roads and finally at the shelter
where kitties awaited me.
Some of them were mine
he dumped there
I wanted to live here
to me this was now home

Sometimes Ari gave me a ride
I'd walk an hour, wait at a bus station
Sometimes a dead cat nearby on the street
hit by a car, common and unnoticed
Smoking now, like everyone else
cigarette butts around every bus shelter
trying to say goodbye to this place
that for all my poverty
my desperation, was lighter now
that he was gone


Grieving, my psyche spinning,
Trying to handle all the contradictory feelings
Loss and relief,
Grief and freedom,
Respect and love for this place
now that he was gone
Surprised by this feeling
Fear of the great unknown
waiting for me, a town
I escaped from eighteen years before
would soon be my new home
on the other side of the planet
I was in nowhere