As insensitive as it may sound,
Sensitivity is not always synonymous
With the human condition:
We can very well hurt someone
And remain immune to their pain.
Everything is in effect –
Cause ‘n’ effect:
Nothing we do or don’t
Do is inconsequential.
(Just because we aren’t
Always conscious of the
Fact, doesn’t mean the
Fact isn’t so)
The only question is:
Consequences
Pure or impure?
We say the right thing,
Write the right word,
Help someone –
A pure consequence.
The wrong thing, the
Wrong word, hurt
Someone – an impure
Consequence.
It’s as simple and painful
As that.
Purity is sensitive;
Impurity, insensitive.
It comes in many different shapes and sizes
Does impurity:
On bodies, clothes, homes.
It can be a part of us; we can
Dress up in it; we can live in it.
But these shapes and sizes
Only tell one angle of the story:
You see, some impurities may be skin-deep –
This one isn’t.
We see facades, faces
Results; but facades,
Faces and results are
Merely the painting
Not the painter.
We see a skin, an exterior blemished, but can we
Even imagine the marks on the inside?
Purity comes in just one shape and size:
The soul truth.
This shall be the law
Of the metzora
On the day of his
Purification
We make mistakes.
Sometimes we hurt the people
That matter most, our brothers,
Our sister; we hurt them with a
Smirk, a condescending remark
Or tone, an evil tongue twister,
Twisting a truth into a lie,
Twisting a pure thought into an
Impure deed –
Twisting a heart.
And we end up outside the camp,
Alone, broken, fragmented into a million
Little pieces, separated from our people
From our selves, separated even from those
Who are separated – we are so broken even
The broken can’t stand us.
The Kohen shall go
Outside of the camp…
But then the purist, the priest,
Who sees not the impurities we’ve
Caused and effected, but the purity
That can never be affected because it
Was not effected; no –
We aren’t an effect –
We are the cause.
But sometimes we forget that we are the cause
That has to affect things in a pure way and it takes
A purist, a priest to see, and help us see, the purity:
For what is a purist if not someone who sees
The purity in everything.
And what is a purist if not a pure someone who
Helps others become purists.
What is a purist if not someone willing to find the
Purity even in the broken?
What is a purist if not someone sensitive –
Sensitive to another’s pain
Another’s purity?
Mendel Jacobson is a writer, poet and journalist living in Brooklyn. His weekly poetry can be seen at jakeyology.blogspot.com
The words of this author reflect his/her own opinions and do not necessarily represent the official position of the Orthodox Union.