by Kayla Schneider-Smith (Rishon LeZion, Israel)
all i can do is be sad today,
and hear about the rockets flying from
one fence to the other
regardless of what mother and her baby
are strolling on the other side,
which man is rolling a cigarette
in the front seat of his truck,
wondering what he’ll bring home his
wife for the weekend
all i can do is not choose a side today,
for sides have already been chosen,
and secured, and posted on doorposts
and upon gates, clung to for life,
the indentation of angry hands meant
to hold instruments, to hold one another,
grasping pocketknives grasping guns
grasping flag poles waving colors in the wind,
blues and whites and greens and blacks and reds
that claim sovereignty claim territory claim God
claim blood
all i can do is keep walking today,
walking to work walking to class
walking to busses
trying to memorize the shape of shelters
the shape of my heart how long it’ll
take me to run when i should duck for cover
when it’ll be too late
all human loss is our loss,
all mess on our fingers is ours,
the brokenness of other bodies is
our bodies’ brokenness,
brothers and sisters refusing to let go
tearing out each other’s spines
pouring all this frustrating summer heat into the gutter,
to dirty the world instead of making it better,
to hurt instead of heal
Kayla Schneider-Smith is a poet, musician, and social activist from Monmouth County, New Jersey. A graduate of Bryn Mawr College, she wrote this poem while completing the Yahel Social Change Fellowship in Rishon LeZion, Israel, where she taught English, piano and guitar to children, adults and senior citizens in a small neighborhood called Ramat Eliyahu. Kayla is currently attending the Master of Fine Arts Writing Program at The University of San Francisco. She aspires to be an English professor, Rabbi, or Interfaith Minister one day.
If you’d like to read her work in prose, visit: https://www.yahelisrael.com/single-post/2018/11/27/To-Be-Or-Not-to-Be-Progressive-Judaism-in-Israel
The Jewish Writing Project 