We are alive!
Sometimes it takes
The end of the book,
The end of the journey
To know that we are truly
Alive!
But we are always alive
Even when it doesn’t feel
Like it, even when we don’t
Want to feel like it, we are alive
Because we come from and always
Are connected to the true and pure
Source of all Life…
But it is at these moments of truth
That we realize we are alive;
And when we realize that we are alive
We see that all moments are moments of truth…
Yaakov lived in
The land of Egypt
Yaakov, Israel, lived before
Then as well; but sometimes
It takes an Egypt to really high-
Light life; sometimes it takes
The hardest squeeze to produce
The purest oil; sometimes it takes
The rope of bondage itself to
Climb over the walls of exile.
We never revel in the pains of
Life merely in the rewards they
Produce; we cannot understand
The suffering but we can use it
To make ourselves grow and rid
The universe forever of all hurt –
We can use the tears we’ve known
To dry all sad eyes and wet cheeks forever…
It is now at the end,
At the end of the book of beginnings,
When we first realize what life is all about
And that we are alive; it’s right before the illness
That the cure is realized and revealed, right before
The exile of Egypt that we realize we are alive and
No constraint can ever hold us back from our redemption
Our Torah, our Promised Land –
~~
It is the journey of the torah
And the journey of our lives:
From the beginning of creation,
In the beginning G-d created
The heavens and the earths
Through the establishment of
A universe and a people ready
To bridge the gap that is heaven
And earth, unite the fragments of
Time and space and finally come
To a realization that we are life and
When we do then even death will not
Get in the way of our mission and life
G-d will surely remember you then you
Must bring my bones up out of here
Life: the certainty and knowledge
That our bones as well as our essence,
Our bodies along with our souls,
Will rise upward from Egypt to the
Land that is both promised and fulfilled
Be strong! Be strong! And may we be strengthened!
Chazak Chazak V’nitchazek
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.