The Diameter of the Bomb

The Diameter of the Bomb by Yehuda Amichai

The diameter of the bomb was thirty centimeters
and the diameter of the its effective range about seven meters,
with four dead and eleven wounded.
And around these, in a larger circle
of pain and time, two hopsitals are scattered
and one graveyard. But the young woman
who was buried in the city she came from,
at a distance of more than a hundred kilometers,
enlarges the circle considerably,
and the solitary man mourning her death
at the shores of a country far across the sea
includes the entire world in a circle.
And I won't even mention the howl of orphans
that reaches up to the throne of God and
beyond, making
a circle with no end and no God.

I leave tomorrow night for Israel. Today I have come into my office, to prep the outlines for the next 2 b'nai mitzvah and the High Holy Days. A friend called, offering to be a voice of reason, "You don't have to go, you know."

The world is grieving right now. The shooting in Seattle, the missle in Abulafia, the Masjid that has been hit, the displacement in Lebanon, Gaza and Israel, the hunger, the darkness, the distance between peace, and all of the death. The responsibility, the blame, the lack of regard for one's own citizens and the lack of regard for the other. The "We will push Israel to the sea" vs. "Dismantle and Destroy"

Sometimes I wonder if I am wishy washy at best or crazy at worst. Bombarded by emails from the right proclaiming the evil of the Arab/Muslim/Terrorist world (they seem interchangeable in the way people use them, but it is so complex and we know not true) and from the left proclaiming Israel's reckless unethicality and blood lust. I wonder like Tevye who is brought to make a decision and he ends up saying to one, "You're right!" and then he listens to the other and he says, "And you're right!" Except, I am saying inside, "You're wrong! And You're wrong!" I keep wanting to say, "... but what about this fact or what about that incident."

How do people close their hearts and accept a reality called, "Well, that is just what happens in a war?" Are there those of us who can speak up and say, "No, these things are unacceptable." Or are we just an idealistic, irrelevant voice that creates more chaos? I am not a soldier, I am a rabbi. Cling to life, seek life...not death. Is it really kill or be killed? I don't ask that with irony or rhetoric, but earnestly. Is that the answer we have truly come to?

For the last few days, people at the gym, at restaurants, even at a dinner party have pulled me aside with some form of the question and with the same parameters: "What is going on in the Middle East and explain it in 2 minutes." Do I even try? Do I just scream and hope they will figure out the details encoded therein or should I just explain how this will affect gas prices and their pocketbooks? Sarcasm rarely is the answer I know, but it works for the Colbert report.

Never have I looked forward to Tisha B'Av in Israel as much as I do now, which will begin my second night in Jerusalem. A holiday that commemorates the pain of Destruction and Exile, is so relevant. It is a container for my pain, my confusion, my disappointment in my local Jewish community and in the local progressive community, which only is a thread of the larger conflict. Fingers pointing in every direction needing to justify their own blindness. This Tisha B'Av, the diameter is wide and I pray that it contain the pain and guide us toward restoration.

As I finish packing, I look forward to this makeshift community I join of GLBT people of faith who have known destruction and exile, as well as, harbor in their own ways.

I leave us with the another poet from the prophetic Israeli writer Yehuda Amichai:

THE PLACE WHERE WE ARE RIGHT

From the place where we are right
flowers will never grow
in the spring.

The place where we are right
is hard and trampled
like a yard.

But doubts and loves
dig up the world
like a mole, a plow
And a whisper will be heard in the place
where the ruined
house once stood.