By Mel Glenn (Brooklyn, NY)
This Rosh Hashonah
I did not go to services.
I did not pray
with the congregation.
I did not walk
up to the Ark.
Instead, I went for my morning coffee
at the local diner.
Was this a crisis of faith?
I don’t think so.
God sat at the next table over
watching me, making sure
I was all right.
He’s OK with me
ordering my usual fare
while I assure Him
my belief is constant and true,
whether I’m reading a
prayer book or a menu.
The practice of religion
may be communal,
but it is also deeply personal,
I think, as I sip my hot coffee
and know with certainty
that in the coming Yom Kippur
I will be inscribed
wherever I happen to be.
Mel Glenn, the author of twelve books for young adults, is working on a poetry book about the pandemic tentatively titled Pandemic, Poetry, and People. He has lived nearly all his life in Brooklyn, NY, where he taught English at A. Lincoln High School for thirty-one years. You can find his most recent poems in the YA anthology, This Family Is Driving Me Crazy, edited by M. Jerry Weiss. If you’d like to learn more about his work, visit: http://www.melglenn.com/
The Jewish Writing Project 