SIMCHAT TORAH WAR

by Elya Braden

“Bereshit” print from Nireh Or

The beginning is the promise of the end.

—Henry Ward Beecher

 

Every Fall we rock the house,

dance & sing & lift the scroll.

Roll back to B’reishit. In the beginning—

chaos cleaved into light & dark

a man a woman a garden a fall.

 

Roll back l’dor v’dor—generation

to generation. 

Roll back Deuteronomy’s gifts—

Ten Commandments, Moses peering

into the Promised Land.

Roll back Numbers’ sufferings—

rod, stone, bland manna,

a wilderness of complaint. 

Roll back Leviticus’ hundreds of tiny edicts

the cost of forgiveness—

denial & purification.

Roll back Exodus’ hungry waters,

locusts, frogs, endless night,

          lambs’ blood to guardian our sons.

Roll back to Genesis—father/mother/handmaid,

multiply two sons & divide 

by one patch of desert.

 

So, who’s to blame for blood feud? 

Isaac & Ishmael? Or their mothers—

Sarah & Hagar? Sarah’s laughter 

withering on her lips as her handmaid 

suckles Abraham’s eldest— 

a legacy of lack & opportunity.

Or blame God—God’s two-faced 

promise: I will make of your son 

a great nation. 

 

Well, one thing we know about land 

is God ain’t making any more.

Yet we multiply like frogs, spill

from lakes & puddles & faucets & mouths, 

our hunger rises like the papery wings 

of a thousand moths splitting their cocoons, 

stripping the trees of green.

 

So why not drone a war on this day 

we dance & sing, raise Torah scrolls 

above our heads to celebrate return? 

B’reishit bara Elohim,

“In the beginning, God created…”

 

Air raid sirens the only psalms now sung 

in this land of too many Gods.

Editor’s Note: Simchat Torah, a Jewish holiday that celebrates and marks the conclusion of the annual cycle of public Torah readings, began for Hebrew Year 5784 on Saturday, 7 October 2023 and ended on Sunday, 8 October 2023.

Elya Braden is a writer and mixed-media artist living in Ventura County, CA, and is an editor for Gyroscope Review. She is the author of the chapbooks, Open The Fist (2020) and The Sight of Invisible Longing (2023). Her work has been published in Anti-Heroin Chic, Prometheus Dreaming, Rattle Poets Respond, Sequestrum, Sheila-Na-Gig Online, The Louisville Review, and elsewhere. Her poems have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net, and Best New Poets.

CASE 1

by Louisa Schnaithmann

“Donald Triplett, the 1st person diagnosed with autism, dies at 89” –NPR, 6/17/2023

I never meant to be a statistic.

I only wanted my numbers, 
to multiply them faster than
a calculator, to visit parts 
of the world people only 
dream about. I was just a man.
I’m not sure why the doctors
were so fascinated by me.
Every day, I was only myself.
What’s so special about that?
I guess they found something there.
Not sure what. My hometown
loved me. Wish I could say the
same about everyone else who
grew up like I did. Maybe it’s 
easier to not understand
than to try. Not sure.
I was always better with numbers.

Louisa Schnaithmann is a bisexual autistic woman whose poetry has been nominated for Best of the Net and the Pushcart Prize. Her work can be found in Anti-Heroin Chic, The Broadkill Review, Gargoyle, and other journals. She is the consulting editor for ONE ART: a journal of poetry and lives in southeastern Pennsylvania.

MORE THAN A CITY OF NUMBERS / A CITY OF NAMES

by Jen Schneider

This maps the victims of gun violence: 1,445 nonfatal and 377 fatal shooting victims as of Oct 2, 2022. —Mapping Philadelphia's Gun Violence Crisis

Philadelphia—

a city of brotherly love 

/ life

more than a city of numbers

/ a city of names

from firsts—

home to the first library, hospital & botanical garden 

            to never quenched thirsts—

grills for infinite steak shops (Pat’s, Geno’s, Tony’s, Nick’s)

a city 

of names & numbers 

/ numbers & names

on the same day the mayor signed an order

for no more guns in the city’s

indoor and outdoor recreation centers 

housed at the corner of numbered

streets, broad, & main

three teams met for a football scrimmage

dozens of players took the field

the temperature a beautiful seventy degrees. 

Autumnal air. Hundreds of passes.

Countless yards gained.

Clocks ticked. Players walked.

The 6000 block of Ridge Avenue.

The 4700 block of Pechin Street.

Zip code 19128. Latitude

and longitude measures of degree.

Suddenly

a shooting spree

Hundreds flee

five gunmen

sixty-four bullets

souls in school clothes drop

to date, in 2022

more than four hundred

Philadelphia-based lives lost

a tragic milestone man-made

a city 

of names & numbers 

/ numbers & names

all of these lives have names

Nicholas.Tiffany.Jose.Steven.Michael.Byron.Tyrell.Dominque.Quianyon.Eddie.Zachariah.Robert.Gerard.Margaret.Lauren.Kasani.Tracey.Chrichnard.Francisca.Tyjon.David.Daquan.Nafee.James.Stacy.Tyheim.Justin.Ry’Keir.Jerome.Sindrell.Tony.Michael.Melvin.Byron.Calvin.Robert.Shawn.Fernand.Daren.Hope.David.Jamal.Charles.Marc.Taion.Bertha.Abdel.Ameer.Lameer.James.Achilles.Shakuur.Irving.Jahsier.Rashed.Kelvin.Stephon.Robert.Joelil.Yusairah.Mary.Gabriel.Leanne.Damon.Rahssan.more.many more. these lives have names. a city of numbers. a city of names.

Jen Schneider is an educator who lives, writes, and works in small spaces throughout Pennsylvania. Recent works include A Collection of Recollections, Invisible Ink, On Habits & Habitats, and Blindfolds, Bruises, and Breakups.

THE AMERICAN GOSPEL (2020 EDITION)

by Avalon Felice Lee

In the beginning…

January judgment 

Red hat, white lies

"The flu is worse!" he scorns

as his gavel cudgels China, the blue-faced, the blue-lunged

The pen of law

holds the ink for healthcare blueprints. 

The dough in his fist

for swab tests; for the people. 

              

February denial

Nailed wrists, or tied hands?

Our savior, or an excuse?

Americans,

             repent!

                          Beware of

                                       fake news

                                                    sham gold

                                                                 idols— 

Nothing to worry about! Nothing at all!

Come to the altar, worship whoever’s crowned

The winged choir guard the American garden

from Wuhan fiends

And so, nib unscathed

Pockets heavy

The Gospel

Good thing he cares for his shares 

The yeast for His bread

unrisen, decayed

So, He Marches forward

And trumpets that “the numbers are good” as is

apparently

contrarily

But April showers make faith dour.

Just in case, behind Jericho bricks

He breaks bread

for swab tests; for His people

crumbs

Oh, you sinner

Cast doubt from your mind!

May you rejoice!

The Savior saves His people!

Good thing he cares for his shares.

Revelation

Though idols dine in violet silk, one day

the synthetic dye will blanch

Dress in your Sunday best, filter masks

Earth will soon steal the recipe for

manna

Sacrifice pedestrian beer

for communion wine, Purell

June bugs, heathens, see the sunup

The world ends not with a virus!

(But by the folly of man.)

Avalon Felice Lee is an Asian-American Californian. She has been writing poetry and prose since the age of eleven. Her works have been published in The Heritage Review, Kalopsia Literary Journal, and elsewhere.

1+1+1+1+1+3+1...= 120,000 AND COUNTING

by Peter Witt

ADAM ZYGLIS, THE BUFFALO NEWS, NY

120, 000 U.S. deaths
a big number,
about equal to the population of
Norman (OK),
Columbia (SC) or
Odessa (TX)

Does this get your attention?

To understand 120, 000
let's break it down
to 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1...
you get the idea,

with each 1 representing a life,
a real person,
someone from our community,
someone's family member.

1 was Yu Lihua, an important
Chinese American writer -
wrote mainly late at night,
smoked True menthol cigarettes.

1 was Valentina Blackhorse,
administrative assistant
for the Navajo Nation,
dreamed of one day
leading her tribe.
Family now raises her
one year old daughter.

1 was James Mahoney,
ICU doctor in New York,
cared for patients
through the HIV/AIDS epidemic,
9/11, the swine flu.
Due to retire
stayed onto help,
he saw it as his duty.

Another 1 was Judy Wilson-Griffen,
clinical nurse who cared
for nursing black women, helping
bring future generations
into the community of St. Louis.

Peter Bainum was 1,
aerospace engineer, who taught
at Howard university for 30 years.
sending students onto NASA
and the aerospace industry.

3 were Nicky, John, Leslie Leake,
Nicky planning wedding,
John the family cutup,
Leslie, dotting mother,
grandmother, great grandmother -
died within 20 days of each other
in Washington, D.C.

and not least was 1 Paul Cary
lifelong paramedic and firefighter,
drove 27 hours from Colorado
to the New York epicenter.
He was carried home in a succession
of ambulances, before his colleagues said
we have the watch from here.

1+ 1+ 1+1+1+3+1 until we have 100,000,
the count goes on,
...1 + 1 + 1+1...

120, 000 is a big number
made up of little numbers,
each of whom
we should never forget.


Author’s note: Life stories were taken from "Faces of the Dead," The Washington Post, May 28, 2020.

Peter Witt is a retired University Professor and 2020 Poet Laureate for the International Poetics Foundation.  

LOCKDOWN DAYS, EARLY SPRING 2020

by Miriam Weinstein

Before this king of viruses came to power,
her mother reminded her daily during phone calls,
I’m 96. Now she reminds her, the hospital won’t 

treat me if I catch coronavirus. Too old. An easy
target for this novel illness. Why waste
a ventilator?

The path by the creek, more popular these days
with gyms closed. A few weak smiles greet her,
some voices mutter hello. Rarely do eyes meet,

most look off in the distance or down at the ground.
People move to the edge of the path or pile of leaves
beside it to pass. We mustn’t get too close.

This is what she feels and fears. The distance, not
the virus itself. The stepping away. The incessant
hand washing. After each time she touches

her iPhone or a door knob? Washing packages
she purchased at the grocery store? This far
she refuses to go, but the checking of numbers

preoccupies her. Generally uninterested in daily
stats, now each morning she notes the uptick.
The confirmed cases, the sick, the dying, the dead.

Birds know spring is here though bits of snow still lie
crusted on flower beds. Time to stake out territory,
robins have returned north. Strutting down sidewalks

and on lawns, wild turkeys arrive out of no where,
peck at the ground. Males with tightly fanned
tails circle females.

Miriam Weinstein’s chapbook Twenty Ways of Looking was published in 2017 by Finishing Line Press. Her poetry appears in the anthologies Reflections on Home: The Heart of All That Is, Nuclear Impact: Broken Atoms in Our Hands, A Little Book of Abundance, Rocked by Waters: Poems of Motherhood, and in several journals.  Her manuscript How To Thread a Needle was short-listed for the Concrete Wolf Louis award competition.

PIVOTS

by Roseann Lloyd

He says he doesn't want the people
to come off the cruise ship
because his numbers will go up...
He likes lots of kinds of numbers
besides the ones that go up
especially the ones he can throw around--
like the millions of masks
like the bigshots who call him at midnight
like the number of reporters he can dress
down in one presser:
That's a nasty question
You don't know what I've ordered
You're a terrible reporter
That's a nasty question [yes, for the second time]
It's not racist to say 'Kung Flu'
I'm not a shipping clerk!

I must pivot away from this vicious old man
and so I turn away from anger to the child
who has come up to me in my chair.
Who says, You look so old. Really old.
Yes, I say, I've had a birthday since I saw you.
Did you see me before I was born?
No, I saw you downstairs playing.

How many numbers do you have?
(After a brief pause for me to decipher)
Desmond, I say, I have 76.
Oh, that's really old.
How many numbers to you have, Desmond?
He holds up fingers on one hand and counts out loud.
1, 2, 3, 4.
Yes. Four. You are growing up.
His grandmother smiles and says her number: 67.
We're sort of twin numbers.

Later at home, I say
Husband, our days are numbered.
Let's enjoy each one.
Let's get married again
When summer comes.

Roseann Lloyd lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She has published four collections of poetry—Tap Dancing for Big Mom (New Rivers Press), War Baby Express (Minnesota Book Award for Poetry),  Because of the Light, and The Boy Who Slept Under the Stars: A Memoir in Poetry (the latter three from Holy Cow! Press)—as well as an anthology co-edited with Deborah Keenan, Looking for Women: Women Writing about Exile (Milkweed Editions), winner of an American Book Award.

CLEARITY

by Mark Williams

Cartoon by First Dog on the Moon

“Hello. I am Austin Baggerly and I am giving my speech
in Mrs. Colley's fourth grade class at West Park Elementary,
which you already know since you are my friends
and you are here too. Mrs. Colley said to give a speech
on something that our country needs more of.
I asked my mom what our country needs more of
and she said clearity. I asked her what is clearity
and she said the state of being clear. I asked her
which state is that and she said the blue ones. Mom says
a person can never ever be too clear. Never.
She says for example take our President who says
the first thing that comes out of his mouth only then
it is too late since it is already confusing everyone.
Like he said when it gets warm the virus will give up
and quit killing old people. I hope so cause Grandma Baggerly
is old and I do not want her to die. But how do we know
the virus does not like hot weather too? It could.
Or when he said he wants to leave the people
on the boat since that would be good for the numbers.
What does that mean? What numbers? Whose numbers?
I heard my mom on the phone telling Aunt Alice
that she is surprised to learn Mike Pence has balls.
She does not mean basketballs or baseballs eccetera.
Even golf balls. She means for once he stood up like a man
to the President and said we do not have enough tests
to see if we have the virus after the President said
we have all the beautiful tests we need. Mom says
just you wait the President will fire Mike Pence
if he keeps being clear since that is the one thing
the President is afraid of even more than the virus.
So always be clear. Also wash your hands. And
Mom says to tell your parents and grandparents
to wash their hands of the President this November.
So that virus doesn't spread too. Thank you.”

Mark Williams lives in the red but otherwise good state of Indiana. His poems and stories have appeared in The Southern Review, Rattle, New Ohio Review, Drunk Monkeys, The American Journal of Poetry, and the anthologies American Fiction and The Boom Project. His poems in response to the current administration have appeared in TheNewVerse.News, Poets Reading the News, Tuck Magazine, and WritersResist.