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.
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