Poem: Sukkot in Jerusalem 5743

eternal cycle of fig and aloe olive and oleander:

a quiet place to watch

the reaching skyward

the kicking free of this unquiet dust

the finding eyes above and a mouth

everything old here

everything left for dead

maneuvers into sunlight

October 1982

From “Without a Single Answer: Poems of Contemporary Israel,” co-edited by Leah Schweitzer and Elaine Marcus Starkman (Judah L. Magnes Museum Press, Berkeley, 1990).

Rabbi Stanley F. Chyet, (1931-2002), was professor emeritus of American Jewish history at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR) and assistant to the president and secretary to the board of trustees of the Skirball Cultural Center.