Tag Archives: how is this night different?

by Cheryl Savageau (Boston, MA)

….for Joseph

no bombs explode in our midst as we speak

but the tv tells stories of children in Paris

and Jerusalem who last night

dipped eggs in salt water

ate bitter herbs

they are dead now

How is this night

different from all others?

tonight we drink the four glasses of wine

schmear horseradish 

and charoset on the

bread of haste

we open the door to

Elijah and sip

from Miriam’s cup

we eat Bubbie’s 

matzoh balls

put an orange on the plate

there is nothing we eat

tonight that is not

a story

after the september bombing

my son and his wife

talked of the family they wanted

how dare we bring

a child into this

world?  but when

has it not been

this way?  how are

we any different?

and in love 

and defiance they 

conceived

tonight their unborn

child is the

stranger we welcome

among us

we will call him

Joseph he will be

loved he will ask

the questions open

the door drink

from the bottomless cup

Cheryl Savageau is a convert and also Native (Abenaki), and this poem is about her first experience as part of a Jewish family, and how she became part of the Jewish people. She has three collections of poetry: Mother/Land, (SALT 2006) Dirt Road Home (Curbstone Press 1995), and Home Country (Alice James, 1992).  Her memoir, Out of the Crazywoods, was published in 2020, and her children’s book, Muskrat Will Be Swimming, was first published by Northland in 1996, then in paperback in 2006. This poem is part of a new collection, New Love/Old Love, looking for a publisher. Visit her website to learn more about her life and work: https://cherylsavageaublog.wordpress.com/

Note: Previously published in the Cape Cod Poetry Review, Vol IV and V Summer 2018, and reprinted here with the generous permission of the author.