Spiritual Sunday
On Friday, I attended Sewanee Elementary School’s annual Peace Pole ceremony. Every year, usually in conjunction with a student that has international ties, the school adds “May Peace Prevail on Earth” in another language to a 30-foot high pole that stands in the courtyard. This year Rumania was honored, and students read researched reports on the country and sang a Rumanian song.
This year’s ceremony fortuitously leads into Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish celebration of the day of creation that begins today. Certainly, the pole is in the spirit of Marge Piercy’s Rosh Hashanah poem “The Birthday of the World,” where she extends the self-examination called for by Judaism’s High Holy Days to ask “what / I have done and not done / for peace.”
Although written in 2006, the poem unfortunately remains relevant as freedoms continue to be “pared, sliced, and diced.” Convicting herself of sloth, the poet resolves to speak out and sounds like the ancient prophets as she does so: “Let my words turn into sparks.”
The Birthday of the World
By Marge Piercy
On the birthday of the world
I begin to contemplate
what I have done and left
undone, but this year
not so much rebuilding
of my perennially damaged
psyche, shoring up eroding
friendships, digging out
stumps of old resentments
that refuse to rot on their own.
No, this year I want to call
myself to task for what
I have done and not done
for peace. How much have
I dared in opposition?
How much have I put
on the line for freedom?
For mine and others?
As these freedoms are pared,
sliced and diced, where
have I spoken out? Who
have I tried to move? In
this holy season, I stand
self-convicted of sloth
in a time when lies choke
the mind and rhetoric
bends reason to slithering
choking pythons. Here
I stand before the gates
opening, the fire dazzling
my eyes, and as I approach
what judges me, I judge
myself. Give me weapons
of minute destruction. Let
my words turn into sparks.
The final image may be borrowed from Percy Shelley’s “Ode to the West Wind,” which concludes,
Scatter, as from an unextinguish'd hearth
Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!
Be through my lips to unawaken'd earth
The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,
If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?
We all need the awakening promised by poetic sparks.
Previous posts on Rosh Hoshanah
Rachel Barenblat: Rosh Hashanah: How to Make It New
Muriel Ruykeyser and Denise Levertov: Rosh Hashanah – A Stirring of Wonder
Marge Piercy: Rosh Hashanah – Weave Real Connections
Enid Shomer: How Rosh Hashanah Is Like Swimming
Amichai Yehuda: Theoretically, a Season for Everything
Emma Lazarus: High above Fire and Flood Ye Held the Scroll
Lucille Clifton: On 9-11 Firemen Ascended Jacob’s Ladder
Rashani: Blowing for Hope in the Face of Darkness
Alicia Ostriker: Enter the Days of Awe