Monthly Archives: July 2020

July 27, 2020 · 6:50 am

An Afternoon Cup of Tea

by Brad Jacobson (Columbia, MO)

Down more than one hundred steps

by an old graveyard and a green mountain

resembling camel humps.

A white towel hangs on a hook.

Water drips into a small pool of water

sunken in a cave. A tsaddik is buried here.

Legend says those that immerse

become pure.

Bobbing in chilly water:

Ad-dah-mah, mah-yeem, shah-mah-yeem.

Earth, water, sky.

I dress without drying off.

In my journal, I write:

My father and I are here together.

Afterwards we walk on the ancient streets of Tzfat

talking and laughing.

My mother joins us for tea.

Brad Jacobson is a volunteer every summer in Israel in the SAREL program. He teaches TESOL at the Asian Affair Center at the University of Missouri, where he has an MEd in Literacy. In the summers he enjoys exploring places with his camera like the Old City of Jerusalem, Tzfat, and the Red Sea where he scuba dives. He has been published in Tikkun, Voices Israel, Poetica, Cyclamens and Swords, and the University of Missouri International News.

“An Afternoon Cup of Tea” is from Brad’s new book, “Lionfish: The Poetic Collection Of A Traveler’s Experiences In Israel,” and reprinted here with the kind permission of the author and publisher.

You can read more of Brad’s poems in his new book. Visit the link to see more: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1946124648/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ref_=pe_3052080_397514860&linkCode=sl1&tag=beeps-20&linkId=b8e4722d77fdd5f0148ae60390d40ec2&language=en_US&fbclid=IwAR3ZBUQsla0CdU7voiaWm5FRPXzEEIglc0tuceGIUFwSsys5u14kBYEscLU

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July 13, 2020 · 9:56 am

Bone on Bone

by Linda Albert (Sarasota, FL)

I turned my back on some of your skills

before I really learned them—bridge parties,

lemon tarts with whipped cream piped around the edges,

three-layered tea sandwiches without the crusts—

because of all the hours I judged you’d lost there,

the chaotic kitchen, the clean-ups that always fell to me.

I got rid of your impatience

right from the beginning—

the time keeper tyrant

who kept you running until

it seemed to me you missed your life.

In that, I might have gone too far,

and now I want some back.

Your maxims, I weeded out along the way—

though I confess that job took years.

If it’s true that God will only help the ones

who help themselves, then who needs God?

Airing dirty laundry in public is sometimes therapeutic.

The bed I make is not the one I always have to lie in;

There is no actual law.

But I do cherish your English bone china,

that set of thirty two with the gold rim and green border

you bought from Uncle Jack’s jewelry store in Ottawa

and confirmed at the Sweet Sixteen

luncheon you made for me.

In fact, I think it would please you to know

I use that china every day.

Whenever I take a plate from the cupboard

I share the meal with you. It’s easier now

since you’ve become my guest.

An internationally published poet, essayist, and former theater director, Linda Albert is also a certified Jungian Archetypal Pattern Analyst and communication coach with a Master Certification in Neurolinguistics, and in recent years her work has focused on conscious and creative aging. Linda’s poetry is influenced by her interest and academic training in those areas as well as by her Jewish heritage, the changing roles of contemporary women, and her personal joys, struggles, and insights.

Author of Charting the Lost Continent: Poetry and Other Discoveries (https://bit.ly/ChartingtheLostContinent), her awards include the Olivet and Dyer-Ives Foundation Poetry Prizes and the Atlanta Review’s International Merit Award for poetry. For more about her and her work, visit: www.lindaalbert.net.

“Bone on Bone” first appeared in Voices Israel 2015 Anthology and is reprinted here with permission of the author. 

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