Ha Lachma Anya – A Poem to Remember when it’s not Passover

Every year, during Passover
I see the boxes of special things
in the supermarket.

Kosher for Passover, pasta
pretzels, pancakes.
Heck you could bake

an entire cake and
feed it to Moses without raising
a mashgiach’s eyebrow.

Pretty soon we’ll have
Kosher for Passover Challah.
No-one will know the difference!

We’re so proud of ourselves
when we can make Passover
taste like not Passover.

And how lucky we are to have
the means to do so. Assuming you
are one of the lucky ones.

It’s one thing to have to
rush out of Egypt without
time to let the bread rise.

It’s another altogether
to not have the dough
in the first place.

To put on your back.
To dry in your sun.
To eat when you’re empty.

Ha Lachma Anya
The real bread of affliction
is no bread at all.

If there are empty mouths
we are still in Egypt.
Let all who are hungry walk

through our open doors.
There’s matzah enough
to go around.