You wear white like a bride to your
own apologies. You stand and nurse

a growling stomach. You moan
and cry for your place in the book.

The air responds in lavender,
the same color as my yarmulke.

We cannot help becoming
purple in our shame. Forgive us,

for we have looked to others
for ourselves, for we have

walked sideways when you
would have us go direct, go

hard, go in humble rage, go
prostrate under the bird feeder

and beg as squirrels do. 
The lights are on in the lobby,

and the gates are slowly
closing. If I make it in by

some obscure grace, let me breed
good by it, let me dance when prompted,

let me feast when the platter is laid with
olives and pickles and coleslaw and

reubens and rugelach and 
all the talismans we chew

to dress a foreign kitchen in
a strange country and name it

Home. Maybe if I finally
learn my lesson, God will give

me what I want. What to do
with all the trees in grief,

their leaves orange, their birds flown,
their roots rattled in the freezing ground?

The same, I’d wager, with my curling mouth,
unable to form the Hebrew,

but well enough to do as all 
my ancestors did and wail.