Parsha Poetry

A sliver of texts leads us toa discussion we can trace back for millenniaWhat is the value of a life?And yet, surely this is not something we can debate!Created in the image of Godisn’t each of us valued above the price of rubiesAren’t we all priceless?Isn’t every human life a universe unto itself?“Save a life

What I wouldn’t givefor Your Cloud of Gloryright nowIt would be a comfortI am preparing to embarkIn some ways I am already in betweenI know what is ahead of meand what I am leaving behindI am ready and not readyI am heartsick and alsoeyes firmly forwardBut there is an Expanseto be crossed in a single

Darknesswas the ninth plague For the Egyptiansit preceded unimaginable suffering and devestationThe death of so many beloved childrenBut for us for the Israelitesdarkness preceded salvationFreedomThe darknesswasn’t just an absence of lightit was an absence of hopeA physical and spiritual manifestation, we are taughtAnd so it seemsperhapsthat what we do in the darknessis what makes all

We learn: After Pharaoh’s first refusal, after the Jewish people’s burden increases because of his words, Moshe can’t imagine redemptionWe seek Redemption now, too but it’s getting harder and harder to imagineTyrants abound Elevated to the highest offices of powerlike kings or God-forbidgodsI fear the future.I too, ask God to make me sureof speechworthy of

For Moses there were many homes The home of his birth and the home of the people who raised him And, like Avram,  God points him toward a land he’s never been to           And calls it Home Having many homes means you never really know whether you’re         

  There is always a past behind us, a future ahead of us. If we are alive there is at least one breath taken           or left to take on either side And each breath, a blessing, If we choose to see it so   A father, dying, blesses his boys

  Joseph and Judah and Benjamin and all the rest And me I’ve got mine too so I know what anyone knows if they came from a womb that some other human also           inhabited   That there is no escaping where you came from; That family reunions are never simply

  Lately I have been walking in Joseph’s shoes. I too came to be a stranger in a strange land through circumstances not completely of my       choosing making the best of the cards dealt to me by life and hoping God had a plan.  I couldn’t quite see it but I was being

  After a hard life all Jacob wants to do is settle           down in the Land of his hard-won inheritance but he can’t escape destiny its seems or family patterns Despite all he should know of favouritism he favours And so begins the dominos that will fall One