Harvest-HaAsif 2012

HArvest-HAasif✡ Temple Emanu-El-Beth Sholomʼs Literary Anthology

writing:

Marcel Braitstein

Esther Amrad Dagan

Marsha Goldberg

Margie Golick

Vivianne M. Silver

Noah Stevens

Sophia Wolkowicz

photos and art:

Aaron Eisenberg

Dr Fred Leitner

Harry Rajchgot

SEVENTH EDITION 5773-2012

Sophia Wolkowicz

HArvest-HAasif

CONTENTS

SEVENth EDITION5773--2012

Words from the editors 1

MARCIA GOLDBERG AFTER THE TRANSIT OF VENUS 2

MARGIE GOLICK GRANDMOTHER 5

Sophia wolkowicz THE HUPPAH 11

vivianne m. silver MY FIRST CLASS 12

Esther Amrad Dagan the alphabet 13

Sophia wolkowicz WHEN NATURE WAS RIOPELLE 17

NOAH STEVENS ARBEIT MACHT FREI 19

Marcia Goldberg DEPENDING ON THE LIGHT WE CARRY TO POSITIONS 25

marcel braitstein Where are the lights of yesteryear? 27

Dear Readers,

The written word, in Jewish tradition, has a special significance. We attach great value to our ancient texts and to the many important works, deeply influenced by these texts, which have come down to us since. Allied with this respect for our ancient literature, Jews accept an historic task of memory, of passing our tradition on to our children. Since the Holocaust, many Jewish organizations have sought to collect the memories of survivors in written and other formats. As our readers know, many of our contributors have shared their memories of this period with us.

Harvest-HaAsif anthology began in 2003 to tap into the literary aspirations of the congregation of Temple Emanu-El-Beth Sholom. Our synagogue, a centre of Montreal Jewish life, seeks to

fulfil the mitzvah of memory in all its dimensions, through worship, study and community building. It is our hope that Harvest-HaAsif can make a valuable contribution to this task and also find its place in the larger context of the Canadian Jewish world through a wider chavurah of readers and writers. Within our community, writing can be a important vehicle of communication, enabling us to know one another better, and perhaps to discover dimensions in one another that otherwise remain hidden. Harvest-HaAsif encourages those in our midst who write and those considering writing, and encourages our children to write as they see the work of their elders. This anthology is a mirror of our shared world, a record of what we have thought and felt.

Our six previous editions have established the fact that we have writers with noteworthy stories to tell. We seek content with a Jewish connection, interpreted and defined in the broadest sense. We welcome work that intends to educate, move or even

unnerve. Work in many genres have graced our pages, including poetry, fiction, memoir and photography. Other modes of literary communication, not in this list, would be welcomed. We are planning to bring Harvest-HaAsif to the world via a website in the near future and hope to be able to publish this, our seventh edition, in both a hard copy and an electronic format.

Zav LevinsonHarry RajchgotEditors

✡

Note from the editors:The current and past issues may be found on the web by entering the following URL: https://sites.google.com/a/gravitationalfields.com/harvest-haasif/ and shortly as a link from the Temple website.

1

Harvest-HaAsif! ! Temple Emanu-El-Beth Sholomʼs Literary Anthology! Seventh Edition! Succoth 5773-2012

https://sites.google.com/a/gravitationalfields.com/harvest-haasif/




After the Transit of Venus

Marsha Goldberg

“Are you the leaf, the blossom or the bole?”” --Yeats, “Among School Children”

Like the hip-hop/ break dance mixed with karateThat wrapped up this evening’s late absorptions, June sixth Wednesday reached the apogeeBeyond which I wonder what else might surpassIts highlights, starting early with a luminousAnd lovely book review, a raffle gift with wine And saunter to the library (despite a gimpy knee) to return the book and purchase wine.Gathering a carton of free books, I moved eagerly, left and right, a master of karateReckoning how a twist or jerk would eclipse the sun’s luminousityNot to mention spoil my approaching mid-day garden pause. Splayed out, absorbedWith The Beginner’s Atlas explanation of map projections which surpassMy life-long understandings, I reached a career- end apogee Reading how the Winkel Tripel’s overall projection of the globe, an apogeeFor grasping all the continents, is less accurate than the azimuthal equidistant kind, as well of color codes from green to wine,Then met The Hermit with the whitened beard before our walk surpassingAll those previous in April and in May; a forceful upward motion lifted us, a spin karateCan’t explain; we passed the sun together walking with our canes, absorbedAt Atwater Market by giant yellow dahlias, hydrangeas on display, his face luminous

2


Picking up petunias and tomatoes I had bought. Thoughts of celestial arrangements, luminous,Spun as he tossed his blue sweater in an orbit, caught a hook a short while later in the yard, the apogeeOf that spiral beyond the wide gazebo on the porch, gold-like absorptions flinging off The Hermit’s bead-wrapped hands like nectar mulled with wine.Across the sun with ankles high, karateStyle, unhurt, I landed as I spun to plant new basil and surpass

All guesses earlier of where the day would go. SurpassAll guesses this day did, luminousWith self-defense and deference, karateSpirit bouncing, flexing, beaming in an apogeegone off all maps, then without a drop of wineWe bid goodbye and I, still wrapped in bright absorptions Waited at a neighbor’s gate admiring their absorptionsLaying out new lawn behind a stockade fence, wild green surpassedAll expectations of what change such changes cause; pink peonies and wineAlready flowering in their dense black soil, their whole yard luminousBefore the darkening of day, the remnants carted to fill in my garden too, an apogeeTo throw the worried heart over with their sense of pity, a trick centered in karate. Now, the light’s absorbed what earlier was luminousBut hovers like a dream, surpasses a century of equinox, perhaps, a kind of apogeeUnmapped, splotched with colors drenched with wine, from one perspective; mine, a day’s disarming boot, a belt, barefoot sure karate.

3


Grandmother

Margie Golick

I just unearthed this memoir fragment written 20 years ago. I sent a copy to James (now 25). We were both amused.

Before I got to be a grandparent I had heard about the joys of that state from other grandparents. A recurrent theme was the pleasures of having the little ones when they are cheerful and charming, and then the relief of returning them to their parents when they needed changing or consoling or discipline. I heard, too, about the special bond between grandparents and their grandchildren - the result of having a common enemy, they said. But these advantages are beside the point. I have just spent two idyllic weeks as the primary care

taker of my five year old grandson, Jamie, and got a clearer picture of the delights of grandparenthood - something you only find out about when you don't have to relinquish them after a few hours. It has to do with nostalgia - a double dose. I remember one of the particular pleasures of being a parent - an unanticipated pleasure, not even hinted at by Dr. Spock - was the chance to be childish again. I was able to dredge up songs, games, childhood myths, and counting rhymes that I hadn't thought of in twenty-five years, to join in games of hide-and-go-seek, Run Sheep Run, to play with plasticene, to draw with crayons, to cut out paper dolls, to totter on ice skates, to do all those good things that conformity to adolescence demanded that I abandon. And, because I have remained inexpert at nearly every sport I've undertaken, (I call myself the most experienced beginner in the world), I could, once again, ski, skate, bowl, and play baseball, with companionship, and without humiliation. Of course, the companionship lasted only a short time, as each of my three

children quickly surpassed me in skill, and preferred the play of peers. Now, another twenty-five years has elapsed since I have had a real opportunity for a nostalgic trip to childhood. So I jumped at the opportunity to have my five year old grandson, Jamie, who lives in another city, come and stay at the country cottage with his Nana and Poppy for a couple of weeks. We have developed a nice relationship since his birth based on visits every few months where we see each other for a two or three days, and on keeping in touch via modern technology. I read books onto a tape and send Jamie a few chapters at a time. He does his share too. He probably achieved a media first by faxing me a drawing he had made in Kindergarten. But brief encounters and long distance liaisons, however charming, are nothing like the pleasures that come from the dailyness of life with a five year old. Not only did I get to romp, and act silly, and engage in endless conversations that followed a different kind of logic than I was used to, and play catch and Casino, but I

5


got to experience, once again, that grave sense of responsibility, that single-minded focus that is a central part of the life of a young mother, or at any rate, the mother of a young child. I got to make Kraft dinner, and fish sticks, and Rice Krispie squares, to officiate at shampoos and teeth brushings, to be the recipient of the good night kisses, and to feel a little hand thrust into mine whenever streets had to be crossed. I also got to remember that special throwing down the gauntlet that five year olds do, between activities, with the dreaded words, "I'm bored. There's nothing to do". Though it was pretty disruptive of the relaxed routines of two adults who are used to spending their days at their computers, or reading quietly by the lake, it was an idyllic time. Each day began around seven with the sound of Jamie getting out of bed, running down the hall to check the digital clock on the kitchen stove for the time. At home he waits until 7:30 to wake his mother. But the semi-insomniac old folks were already

awake, and called him in to our room where we were reading or drinking coffee. He was still rubbing the sleep out of his eyes, but was ready for the challenge of a country morning - a breakfast picnic on the dock and a before breakfast skinny dip. We would carry the cereal down to the lake. (He had helped to buy the groceries for his stay. While we stocked up on All-Bran and Oat Bran, he had picked out Pebbles. ("Next year, I want Cocoa Pebbles"). And we would sit in the sunshine, and lean over the dock and count the little sunfish that loitered in the shadows. It was when we were gazing into the water that I got to tell him the story of Narcissus, the beautiful boy who fell in love with his own image. Some mornings we would wake up the Echo in the mountain across the lake, calling the names of all the family members, and hearing the name reverberate back to us. When we were nicely warmed up, it was time for the swim. "Turn around", I'd say to Jamie, "I'm going to take off my suit." "Don't worry, " he'd reassure me, "I won't laugh".

Swimming was a major part of life at what we came to call "Camp Nana'. At the outset of his stay he would venture cautiously into the Laurentian lake - considerably colder than the Y pool where he took his swimming lessons - and wade a little, and come out after a few minutes and huddle in a towel. After a couple of days of acclimatization and exposure to the neighbours' water babies, two little girls that spent hours jumping and diving and splashing and cavorting in the water - he was right in there. I did the count down, and the words came back to me "One for the money, two for the show, three to get ready and four to go", and off the end of the dock he j u m p e d , s h o u t i n g " G e r o n i m o " , o r "Cowabunga", or "Bonzai". For the first day, he wore a life jacket for these flying leaps, then opted for a belt with floaties that I bought him at great expense, and then, after about five minutes of experimentation with that, there he was, with no supports, flinging himself off the dock in the cannonball, or the duck dive, or the scissors, and swimming like

6


a pro. And, I remembered all the facets of lifeguard duty, which included vigilant counting of heads, and watching for blue lips, and chattering teeth, and hauling in shivering bodies and wrapping them in towels. In between swims we had other athletic adventures. Poppy had bought Jamie assorted balls and bats and mitts. We practiced basketball shots at a neighbour's net. I had been a dud at high school basketball and never made the team, but with the junior size ball and the net at a lower position I had my first real successes on the court. Jamie and I were about evenly

matched and had a good time. We practiced pitching and hitting with the plastic baseball bat and ball. The first time we did it Jamie wanted to be the starting pitcher. He pitched a ball, which went behind me, far from home plate, which I sensibly ignored. "Strike one!", he yelled. "That was no strike, " I protested. "That was a ball". "Oh, " he said, looking a little sheepish, "I didn't know you knew about balls". In honour of Jamie's visit I got invited to the neighbourhood multi-generational baseball game. It usually consists of children and parents - mostly daddies - but the game can accommodate

a grandmother. Rules are slightly different from those in big league games. Women are allowed five strikes. Men switch hit. A hit outside the field is an automatic out. Four and five year olds can hit from a T rather than a pitch, and their daddies can act as pinch runners where necessary. Jamie and I were on opposite teams, and as first baseman, I had no intention of trying to get Jamie out at his first time ever at bat in a real live game, and was very annoyed when some outfielding Daddy came and grabbed his grounder and ran to first base to tag him out, knocking him down in the process and hurting his elbow "really bad". After that

7

Harry Rajchgot ©2008


Jamie elected to sit on the side lines and watch the rest of the game, but he took comfort in the fact that he had practically hit a home run. The zealous player who had decked him felt that the lesson for little ones was that winning was always important. It turned out he had just sent his three boys to an expensive baseball camp, and didn't want to set double standards for them, by letting, even a five year old, get to first base. We went bowling a couple of times on rainy days. I hadn't bowled since I was 12, and had no idea that alleys were all computerized, with video displays and automatic scoring and animated figures that celebrate your triumphs and defeats - like on the scoreboard at the Olympic stadium. I was as excited as the kids I had with me - Jamie, as well as two neighbour children, ages 4 and 7. I ended up with the lowest score, but nobody laughed. On our hikes, especially when he thought it was time to turn around, I found myself cheering us on with the song my father and I had sung together when we walked on country roads, and which I sang

with my children, "Oh we ain't got a barrel of money, Maybe we're ragged and funny., But we travel along singing a song, Side by side". Soon Jamie was chiming in. Other country customs I hadn't practiced in years surfaced. I taught him to pop the poppers growing along side the road, to find out from daisies if she loves me or loves me not, to hold buttercups under your chin to see if you like butter. J a m i e l o v e s t o t a l k , a n d conversations generally dominated mealtimes, walks, picnics, TV viewings, card games, before bed routines, and jig-saw puzzle activity. I began to remember that the conversation of a five year old often follows a different logic. It is rife with non-sequiturs, personal associations, Walter Mitty-like fantasies. I regret not turning on a tape-recorder or writing some dialogues down at the time. A few fragments remain. "I'm not allowed to say 'damn', except if I say 'Saddam' it's alright". "How can you tell if you're Jewish?"

(While lying down on the baseball field in the middle of play). "This is the seventh inning stretch. Sometimes the pitcher lies down on the grass when it's the seventh inning stretch". After a long walk, when he was beginning to get tired, we caught sight of the car in the distance. I pointed it out to encourage him. "Maybe it's not the car. It could be a hologram" . "How can we tell?" I asked. "If it's a hologram," he said, "we'll be able to walk right through it". "Did you ever get a Gram Slam in baseball?" When he was complaining that there was nothing to do, I suggested he take his crayons and draw a picture, "No," he said, "I hate Arts and Crafts!" He told me how much he loved one of my friends, enough to marry her, he said. "Except, " he added, "when I'm old enough to get married, she'll be dead." Mortality was one of his themes. He brought it up several times. "Can I have the country house when you're dead?" "I'm going to live until I'm a million".

8


I remember that some of the conversation reflected a little worry about the challenge of going into Grade One in the fall. "You get so much work that you're never allowed to play". I reassured him on that score, telling him that the teacher knows just the right amount to give someone who's almost six. He also expressed some concern about recess because the Grade One boys on the playground were big and tough. He seemed surprised when I said that the Grade One boys were not going to be those kids he had seen in the playground last year, but all of his friends from kindergarten. We talked a lot on topics to which I was not much of a contributor - about Ninja Turtles and sewers and Super Mario II - but it was every bit as interesting as the endless conversations my friends and I have about cholesterol. He insisted that he knew how to play chess, but when we got out the chess

how to move the pieces. He wanted desperately to play Scrabble, but acknowledged that he didn't know how to spell. I found that he had a mixture of wild ambition to do all the things that he had seen older children do, and realistic a p p r a i s a l o f h i s o w n s k i l l s a n d temperament. "I'll go blueberry picking, but I'm going to eat them while I pick". "I don't like videos. They take too long". "Are five year olds allowed to water ski?" "If we go in the motor boat, go very slow. I don't like when it goes fast. I can't look at the scenery".

He i s beginning to ge t interested in riddles, though his versions are sometimes garbled and give away the punch line. But one or two of his riddles nudged a dormant compartment in my brain, and out came a barrage of knock-knock jokes, and Little Audrey jokes and "What did one wall say to the other wall?"; and

"What did the carpet say to the floor?" Jamie can read! Not books. Books are for being read to. But signs, labels, greeting cards, ads, bumper stickers and T-shirts. He is always passing along surprising bits of information. "You shouldn't drink Diet-Coke", he says, examining the can, "It has Nutra-Sweet and Aspartame." As the primary care-giver, I was careful about nutrition, making sure, like Jamie's mother does, that he ate something green every day (Pistachio ice cream doesn't count) and drank his milk, and had plenty of fiber. But as grand-mother and co-conspirator

9


I could not resist the urge to indulge us both in things we wouldn't get if we weren't together. Besides, Jamie said when he arrived, "My mother said you're probably going to stuff me with junk". So we did go out for ice-cream a couple of times, especially soft chocolate dipped in chocolate. We did put marshmallows in our hot chocolate after an icy swim. I did bake a blueberry pie with blueberries Jamie helped pick. Once I bought him a box of Smarties (which we shared). And we had chocolate chips and potato chips in the house, and made pop corn and once, only once, I let him have a Sprite with his hot dog. I took bed time pretty seriously, and mostly saw to it that baths and stories got done in time for him to be tucked in by 8:30. But there were a couple of hot nights around the full moon when I remembered that our kids always begged for an A.S.S. (After Supper Swim), and Jamie and I went out to swim in the moon beams reflected on the water.

But now he is gone and the house is quiet, and there are no claims on our time, we are back at our computers and getting lots of reading done and eat serious meals with salads and fresh fruit. And the living room is tidy. And it's boring. There's nothing to do.

✡

10


The Chuppah ©

Sophia Wolkowicz

The procession started witha solemn figure leading the wayThe tall reed grass glinted in the lightand rustled asthe bridesmaids took their stationsThen the grandmother paced towardsthe chuppah and she was flanked bypast and future on her side.Next, followed the groomLinked arm in arm, he was led tothe canopy.The setting sun peeked from under the fringed covercasting a golden glow on the lace floor aisle where the page, who just took his first steps,nestled into his mother’s arms. A song announced the bride’s entrance Linked arm in arm, she was led tothe groom.The tall reed grass swirledto the fan of her gown’s skirtas she counted the turns around him. When the sun set behind the chuppahand the benedictions made,The tall reed grass merged intoa solemn shadow taking a farewell bow to the procession A wave gently lapped intothe edge of summer andclasped hand in hand, two people led the revelry.

✡

Aaron Eisenberg ©2003

11


MY FIRST CLASS

Vivianne M. Silver

My heart was racing, my palms were wet, my knees felt a bit wobbly, but with my head held up high, I walked into my first class. That was back in September 1969, at the opening of Dawson College, the first English CEGEP, at its original Selby Campus. Hired by Mr. Paul Gallagher, its first Director General, I was to teach French as a Second Language. About twenty five or so eager faces looked up at me, in disbelief that this pony-tailed, mini-skirted person could actually be their teacher. Their expectations gave me the confidence I needed to just “do it”. So, I began with what was to become my signature greeting: “Bonjour la classe. En forme? Allons-y.” Back then, it was followed by: “Je m’appelle Madame Silver et je suis votre professeur de français.” I haven’t looked back since for my journey as an educator has been a blessed one. True, it was not always an easy road but that’s what made it a challenging one. Back then, there were no maternity leaves, so, while I was busy raising my three sons, I lost quite a bit of seniority. Holding on to my job often meant accepting to teach at Dawson’s other campi –Viger, Lafontaine, the New School on McGill St., evening classes for Conted, Intensive courses for nursing students, to finally the much awaited Mother House on Sherbrooke St.

In my travels over the years, I was able to discern the many changing faces of my students, from the” flower children “of the 60’s, to the “techies” of the 21st century. Always passionate about my sincere belief in the potential of young people and always treating them with the same respect I expected from them. It seems that in retrospect the experience helped to strengthen the muscles that I needed when I was eventually transferred to John Abbott College in 1994. It was at that college that my professional life truly flourished. I was made to feel most welcome by the administration and by my colleagues of the French Department. My underlying philosophy of “I am my classroom” was serving me well. A couple of years later, I was appointed Coordinator of the Women’s Studies and Gender Relations Certificate. A position I held proudly for eleven years. In the letter from the Director of Human Resources, Mrs. Donna Yates, that I was given when I left, she stated: “Vivianne is a teacher who has stood out, she is a person who has performed her teaching duties with a remarkable degree of professionalism, energy and love for her calling.” There were other letters written on my behalf –from the Director General of the College, Mme Ginette Sheehy, from the Dean of Arts, Mr. Tom McKendy, from my colleague and former chair of the French Department, Daniel Gosselin. They were my medals when on December 15th of this year when I retired after forty-two years of teaching.

At the wonderful luncheon held in my honour, I shared my sentiments with allpresent. I felt that beyond the sadness in leaving behind what I have truly loved, I was comforted by two thoughts. One that I had done a “good job” and that with my departure, a younger member of my department who was just at the beginning of her career, now had a chance to hold a full- time position. So, my last day was just like my first day, I left with the words James J. Metcalf in the Teacher’s Prayer that I would recite at the beginning of every year: A gift from my dear husband Brahms when I began my career. I want to teach my students how To live this life on earth.. To face its struggles and its strife And improve their worth Not just the lesson in a book Or how the rivers flow But how to choose the proper path Wherever they may go To understand eternal truth And know the right from wrong And gather all the beauty of A flower and a song For if I help the world to grow In wisdom and in grace Then I shall feel that I have won And I have filled my place And so I ask Your guidance, God That I may do my part For character and confidence And happiness of heart.

Indeed, I left with “happiness of heart.”

✡12


The Hebrew AlphabetAn excerpt from the unpublished

novel, Olive Trees

Esther Amrad Dagan

She was born on Purim day in the early 30s in Jerusalem’s old city. On the day she was born, her grandfather Mored-Chay named her Malka, Queen, after Queen Esther. She called him Sabaa; he nicknamed her Malka-ti, my queen. He used to pickle olives and sell them in jars at the Souk Muslim market. After kindergarten she walked to her home in the Jewish quarter and occasionally, against her parents’ advice, she would run to the Souk to sit in her Sabaa’s lap. When he bent his head to kiss Malka’s neck and his long beard tickled her, she would pull away. Before she ran off, he always slid his hand into his pocket, pulled out a candy and gave it to her: “Have a sweet day, Malka-ti.”

The first pencil she was ever given was a gift from her Sabaa. “With this”, he said, “you are going to learn how to write our Hebrew alphabet.” He handed her a shiny new orange pencil.

“Sabaa,” she said, “I can’t write with an unsharpened pencil.”

“I know, Malka-ti, my queen! Here is a mil, a penny. Go to the alley on the right and you will find, beside the Madrassa—you know where the Madrassa is?”

“Yes, where the Muslim boys sing the Koran.”

“Good girl,” he said. “Beside the Madrassa entrance you will find Saayid.”

“Who is Saayid?”“He is my friend who has a new

invention—a shiny little machine with a hole and a rotating handle attached to a wooden tripod. They call it a pencil sharpener.”

“A machine?”“Yes. All you need to do is push the

pencil into the hole, turn the handle and oops! A miracle! The pencil is sharpened. Just give Saayid his mil and he will

sharpen your pencil. Then come back immediately. I am waiting.”Malka faithfully obeyed her grandfather. She found Saayid next to the Madrassa, stood behind the long line of boys and waited her turn. Saayid recognized her with a smile, but when he saw that the boys were mocking and pushing her around, he pulled her out of the line, and said: “Give me your

pencil.” Ignoring the boys’ protests, he pushed her pencil into the hole. Zzzzzzzzzzz. “Here it is.” She gave him the mil and ran straight to her Sabaa’s lap. Her sharpened pencil in his hand, he wrote on a piece of paper, saying out loud: “This… is… a-le-ph, the first letter in the Hebrew alphabet. Copy it. Here. Carefully.” She did. Glancing at her, he said: “This is nice, Malka-ti, but your aleph is limping.”

“Limping?”“Yes,” he said. “Look, one of your

aleph’s legs is much longer than the other. Imagine yourself with one leg longer. You would limp, right?”

“Right.”“Try again, my sweetie”, he said,

caressing her hair. He examined her second aleph, and softly whispered: “Malka-ti, this aleph is very sick.”

“Sick?”

13


“Look at its two heads. One of them is all right, but the second is bending like a sick man.” He showed her again, saying, “The alephs’ heads should be stretched up like this, healthy and proud.”

“Why proud?”“My sweetie, aleph is the first in our

letters, the number one, the leading one. It has to be proud.”

“Why was the aleph chosen as the leader?”

“Let me tell you a story” he said. “Long, long ago, all the letters argued

over who should be the first. They assembled to choose their leader. The debate lasted all night with no conclusion. At dawn, the letter shin declared: ‘I should be the first.’ ‘Why?’ everybody raved. The shin said: ‘I have three heads. I am the wisest. I should be the first.’

“The letter lamed interrupted: ‘I am the tallest. You can see me from afar. I should be the front runner.’

“‘Look who is talking,’ said the yod. ‘Although I am the smallest, I deserve to be the first.’

“‘Is that so?’ said the resh. ‘And why is that?’

“‘I am very important. I am the first in the name of God, Yehowa.’

“‘So what?’ said the beth. ‘The aleph is the first letter in the name of God, Adonay.

Although I am the first in the book of Genesis, Bereshit, in my opinion the aleph deserves to be the first. I’m ready to compromise and be the second.’

“‘ I still don’t understand why the aleph should be the first’, said the vav.

“‘With two heads and two solid legs,’ said the dalet, ‘the aleph, in my opinion, is exactly what we need.’

“‘No way,’ said the letter hey, ‘I have to be the first.’

“‘You can’t!’ said the letter chet. ‘One of your legs, unlike mine, hangs in the air. I am for the letter aleph, too.’

“‘Why not me?’ yelled the samech. ‘The word sefer, book, begins with me. Imagine a world without books.’

“‘Yes, yes, the samech is right,’ said the aleph. ‘A world without books, sefarim, has no meaning at all. Imagine our life without our Sefer Torah.’

“‘You are a closed circle,’ said the dalet. ‘a prison, a cage. No one can get in or out. You cannot be our leader. We need someone with an open head, like the aleph.’

“‘Yeah! Yeah!’ jumped in the letter kof”. ‘Do you agree that our Sefer Torah is sacred, kadosh? See? It began with me, Ka-dosh. I should be the first!’

“‘Speaking of the kadosh, I am the first in the Torah’, chimed in the tav. ‘I should be

the leader but if you don’t agree, my other choice is to be the last’.

“‘We are wasting our time’, interrupted the letter bet. ‘If you do not agree with me about the aleph, let’s have a vote. The one who gets the majority will be chosen as our leader.’”

All of a sudden Mored-Chay became silent. Malka, waiting, asked: “Sabaa, did you fall asleep? What happened?”

“About what?”“About the election? The vote? How did

it end?”“Oh, oh, yes. They did vote. Well, the

majority voted for the aleph. Since then, aleph is the first —the leader, the number one—in our alphabet.”

“That’s it, Sabaa?”“Well,” he said, “I forgot to tell you

what happened after the election.”“What happened?”“That was something to remember. The

aleph was lifted up to the stage and everyone was clapping hands and screaming ‘Aleph! Aleph! Aleph!’ When the commotion subsided, the aleph humbly spoke: ‘Thank you. Thank you for choosing me to be the first. But let me tell you what I think: in my opinion, you all are the first. Each of you appears first in many words. We are equal’. Loud applause. ‘Do we want to create meaningful words?’ All the letters chanted,

14


‘Yes, yes, yes!’ Then the aleph said ‘in that case, we should always cooperate’. The applause continued.”

That night at home, Malka eagerly copied the aleph many times. Some were big, some were small; some long, some short. Some skinny, others fat.

The next day, her grandfather was pleased: “This is beautiful, Malka-ti. I knew you were a fast learner. But we still have to put those letters in some kind of order.”

“What order?”“Here. I have a gift for you.”“Another gift?”“Yes, a copybook for your homework.

Each page you will devote to one letter. See those double lines? They will guide you where to start and where to end each letter. Look here. Your alephs seem like a bunch of savages. If you write them between the lines, they will be like soldiers. Here, try it.”

Malka filled up the first line while repeating “aleph, aleph, aleph”.

“See?” her grandfather said. “Now they look nice. Sit down, Malka-ti. Here is the letter bet.”

A few weeks and many pencils later, Malka not only knew how to write the

alphabet, she also knew their names by heart. Her accumulated copybooks were full of well-controlled letters.

Mored-Chay showed his customers his granddaughter’s achievement. “Isn’t it beautiful?” he asked, fishing for compliments. Energized by Malka’s progress, Mored-Chay had long-term plans to teach her, first the nikud, the signs for the a, e, i, o, u, then to teach her to read the Torah, the daily prayers and much beyond.

One evening, while Mored-Chay was expecting to have supper with his wife Dina, Malka’s grandmother, he was surprised. Instead of serving the food, she put a jar of pickled olives on the table.

“What is this?” he complained. “I am hungry!” Angry, Dina responded, “Many hours a week I beat the olives one by one to prepare them for you to pickle and what do I get? Nothing.”

“What do you mean?”“You used to give me ten mils every

week to buy our food. Right?”“Yes”.“How much have you given me in the

last four weeks?”“I don’t know.”“You’ve given me nothing. I borrowed

money from my sister to put food on this

table. What happened? Aren’t you selling olives anymore? Or perhaps you are spending your money on a mistress?

“Dina, Dina, you know I love you.”“So, what happened to your money?”Mored-Chay told her about buying the

copybooks and the pencils and sharpening them for Malka.

“You want us to starve because you are teaching Malka?”

“What do you want me to do?” he said desperately.

“If you want to continue spending money, you either increase your sales or reduce your costs.”

“I don’t know what to do”, he said. “It’s your problem”, said Dina and she

left without serving him dinner.The next morning, he made an

agreement with the vendors of the copybooks and the pencils. Instead of paying one mil for each, he bought a dozen and paid only 6 mils.

That same afternoon, hand in hand with Malka, he went to see Saayid.

“Qif-halak, Saayid? How are you?” asked Mored-Chay.

Saayid said, “How are you ya-achuy, my brother?”

Mored-Chay went straight to the point: “Saayid, I paid you 35 mil to sharpen my

15


granddaughter’s pencils for the last four weeks. Am I right?”

“If you say so.”“This is too much! It doesn’t

even include the cost of all the copybooks and the pencils I had to buy.”

“How much do you want to p a y ? ” a s k e d S a a y i d i n a comforting voice.

“I’ll pay you one mil per week. That’s it. If you don’t agree, I will sharpen her pencils with my razor. Here are four mils in advance for the next month. What do you say?”

“God bless you! Of course I agree. We are friends, aren’t we?” said Saayid, who preferred to get four mils per month instead of nothing. They shook hands.

On that day, although Mored-Chay did not sell a single jar of pickled olives, he was happy with his savings. After the first month, Mored-Chay brought Saayid a big jar of pickled olives to express his gratitude. Saayid, surprised, said “Shukran, ya-achuy, thank you, my brother. My wife loves your pickled olives. They are the best.” To express his gratitude, he said, “From now on, you don’t have to

pay anything for Malka’s pencil sharpening, even if it will be one thousand a month!” They hugged each other.

And so the story goes. Malka continued to sharpen her pencils with Saayid for free and by the time she reached Grade 1, she was reading fluently.

Although Saayid continued to sharpen Malka’s pencils for free, he sharpened the pencils of many of her classmates at full price; one mil per pencil and, occasionally Mored-Chay supplied him with all the pickled olives that his family could eat. Dina received twenty mils per week instead of 10. Mored-Chay’s reputation as the best producer of pickled olives in town increased his sales. One day he surprised Dina by planting an olive tree in their courtyard.

✡ Harry Rajchgot ©2011

16


When nature was Riopelle, the leaves clung to their colors andthe melancholy grey sky concededto showcase the gold obliques flappingin the gust that tried to pry themfrom silhouetted branches

When nature was Riopelle,The patches of light between the tree topswere interrupted by parts of the V geese formationSonic contact sounds bounced across the horizon

When nature was Riopelle,The rows in the apple orchard turned to chaosMuddy paths merged with trampled patches of grass which was strewn with rotting crimson apples and fragile twigs

When Nature Was Riopelle ©

Sophia Wolkowicz

When nature was Riopelle,The apple trees were askew and the horizontal lengthof their jutting limbs was much longer than their trunk,halting walkers to step to the side and to crisscross backwards to capture the entirety in their field of visionRandom lines rearranged by the viewer’s movement

Mid autumn is like an abandoned tableAfter a feast withRemnants of devoured treats andair still warm from first love’s joyWhen nature was Riopelle,Moments defied gravity

✡

17



Sophia Wolkowicz ©2011

18

Arbeit Macht Frei

(“Work Makes You Free” sign above the entrance to

Auschwitz, and other concentration camps)

Noah Stevens

I

The train finally stops, and opens its doors. We step out. Seconds turn into minutes, and then hours. Days become weeks. And then months. Years. A meal takes an entire lifetime. Sleep fills a century.

We a r e f o r c e d t o g i v e u p o u r possessions. Clothes. Valuables. Money. Watches. Rings. Photographs. It is forbidden to make a plan. To hatch it inside the brain, and then cast it, in the imagination, to a soft place inside the future. A fence is placed around the mind; barbed wire now presses upon the heart.

A number is burned into my arm. I am defiled. I cross the threshold into nothingness. This makes them feel like something. They go home to their wives and kids and say: today I made a Jew feel like nothing. You should have seen their faces. We are going to kill them in a few days, anyway. But in the meantime, you


should see their faces. We make them give everything up. You should see the faces of people who have to give up all their money

and possessions. We make them strip. You should see the faces of people who stand naked, and see each other naked, in public. We tattoo them – you should see how they file up and walk away like cows. Boy, you should see their faces. They are nothing.

II

Instants fall like rain, around me. The turning of a head takes forever. Greetings linger inside the air, floating. Conversations refuse to pronounce themselves finished, despite the absence of anything else to say. Suddenly, I can see my son has grown, and the years have passed. And it is still early afternoon.

To recall. A face. The sound of s o m e o n e ʼ s v o i c e o v e r t h e telephone. A certain way the snow fell. The smell inside a personʼs home. The angle of a certain tree that I always passed on the way home from school. The way my father drank his beer.

I remember music. Rather, I remember being able to remember. I remember melody. It is the hearing of something pleasant. The way

music, or any sound, touches the shapes of your face, and having done so, reproduces them inside my hearing. I remember believing in love. I remember saying things like…wait…I wrote it down somewhere…My hands are questions that your hands answer.

The next second, a desert. Wander. Look. Smell. Rest. Wander. Stop. Gaze. Measure distance with your eyes. Spread the hand of your mind across the map of memory. How far have I come from the left, to the right side of my brain. From beginning to now. I no longer know for sure what it is I am searching for. Sand. Particles. Particles upon particles. An ocean of particles. Distance. Distance that displays itself before my eyes, as if to mock them, saying: can you possibly cover this? Heat. Heat

that invades, and pushes everything else aside. Heat that leaves no room for the skin

19


to retreat, no coolness for the lungs to take refuge in. Heat that banishes oxygen, and takes up residence inside everything that is, and is not, its residence. Arbeit Macht Frei.

III

It is the time before dawn, when the cold snakes in beneath my skin and sharpens its teeth upon my bones. What is left of my consciousness lifts itself into my eyes and says: I am still alive, I am not dead yet. The day is a precipice, and so is work. I must step into it. I rise. I stand. I march.

I carry bricks. Each one represents another day in the life of this camp. I am a slave doing my captorʼs work. The bricks are loaded onto my back. There are now so many, that I cannot stand up straight. More still are loaded, until my already curving, breaking back cannot curve anymore. I must move. I try to walk. My feet slip in the slush and snow, they get stuck in the mud. I am an ant carrying an elephant. I am a year holding a century aloft. I am life carrying a load of death.

But I must not fall, or waver, or stop, for even a moment. I cannot be seen to hesitate. They would think me weak: and you know what they do to the weak. Fear is a horse, and it rides upon my bones. All day, and all night. I try not to die.

IV

Perhaps I am one of the lucky ones. Perhaps not. Others are marched out of the

camp every day, and back in every night, beneath a sign that says: Arbeit Macht Frei. They work in factories, foundries, mines, or open fields. They fill bags of cement, or pour steel, or mine coal, or defuse bombs. They fill their lungs with cement, or coal dust. They are burned by drops of molten metal. They are blown up by bombs that didnʼt defuse in time. They are underfed, overworked, exhausted, sick, in pain, and unprotected.

They are beaten if they rest. They are attacked by dogs if they drop, or break anything. They are punished severely if they make a mistake of any kind. Once, I saw someone stumble, and fall. He was kicked, and then whipped. The ones that die during the course of the day must be carried back, by their comrades, for roll call. You see, we are not even allowed to die at the wrong time.

Fear fills my mouth with sand.

V

I never have enough food. I think only of food, I want only food. I will do anything for food. My definition of ʻanythingʼ grows daily. I will fight. Lie. Cheat. Steal. Hate. Betray. Be inhuman. For food, I will forget God. Others. Myself. I will offer my body. There is not a second that is not filled with thoughts of food. Like a gravity within me, hunger pulls my cheeks together, and my eyes and my voice back into my head. It shrinks my steps. It robs each one of my desires of bone and muscle. It drains my will of its

Warsaw Ghetto Wall- Dr. Fred Leitner, ©201220


vital fluid. It presses upon my soul, suffocating. It extinguishes my inner flame.

It invites death over for visits. Longer and longer visits.

VI

I am afraid of the beatings. The ones Iʼve had, and the ones I will have. They have become so frequent that I get nervous when too much time goes by without one. Sooner or later, some guard will find an excuse. I know that. My body is a cave, and I am having trouble finding my way out. My mind is shouting, but I cannot make out what it is saying.

VII

The smell of death is everywhere. The ovens. The victims are being incinerated, and their captors are incinerating themselves.

Life. Death. They are becoming harder and harder to tell apart.

VIII

Believing what has happened here will be difficult.

Forgetting, impossible.

IX

Why are we here?

What is it that occurred over the course of the last two thousand years, what distortion in the course of human evolution, what perversion of the law of moral gravity, would bring history to this

point, where it vomits the worst of the human past back into the present.

What was our mistake, over the course of all these years: what tax did we not pay, to what potentate or well-born thug did we not genuflect, which country did we forget, for a second, to be exemplary citizens of.

Which language did we not learn. Which laws did we not obey. Which system did we not play by. Which government did we

barbed wire-Majdanek- Dr Fred Leitner ©2012

21

Harvest-HaAsifTemple Emanu-El-Beth Sholomʼs Literary Anthology! Seventh Edition! Succoth 5773-2012

fail to serve, loyally. Which one of the sciences did we neglect to become experts in, which vaccine, or cure, did we forget to invent, which universe-explaining theory did we fail to propose; please tell us. Which symphony did we neglect to compose, which painting did we neglect to paint, which book was it, that you blame us for not having written.

X

What is the nature of suffering?

To be a witness. Just because a friend is dead, does not mean you donʼt hear his voice anymore. Just because a family member has been killed, does not mean you donʼt see her face right in front of you, or that her hand no longer rests upon your arm. Just because in this instant there are people all around you, does not mean the absence of others does not pull at you, with all its gravity, like a falling tide does at your ankles.

To be an accomplice. To be forced to make others suffer. To get blood on your hands, and on your soul. The guilt will eat you from the inside, like gangrene. This is their plan. They divide us. They give some authority over others. They give them small, insignificant privileges, which consist in making their misery slightly less. Like having cigarettes to smoke. Then they

make them participate in the chain of command. They make them take orders. They make them carry them out. They make them participate in the killing.

This is their sport. This is their satisfaction. The greatest perversion they can think of: Fathers witness the torture of their wives and daughters. Mothers participate in the torture of their children.

Jews are made to kill Jews.

To them, this is their greatest success.

perimeter fence-Majdanek- Dr. Fred Leitner, ©2012

22


XI

Where is G-d?

Perhaps He is observing us from a great distance, and asking Himself: who are these people I created. Why did these humans descend to the form of animals, no, worse than animals, and slaughter their innocent brothers. Perhaps He is with the guard who is pointing his rifle at someone, or with the one who is herding a group of people to the ʻshowersʼ. Perhaps He is trying to save their souls. Perhaps He is in the mud beneath our feet, overcome with sorrow and remorse for letting this happen. Perhaps He is in the last remaining shade of colour in the sky above us. Perhaps He is in the bunk next to me. Perhaps He is the thin soup I eat. The shovel that I lift. The liquid inside my veins. The doubt inside my mind. Perhaps He is in the gas chamber, right now. Being murdered for the fourth time today.

XII

I cannot be sure of anything, anymore.

Not love, not hate. Not absence, not presence. Not loyalty, not betrayal. Not the earth beneath my feet. Not the fact of my existence. Not the fact of the end of my existence. Not meaning. Not the meaning of meaning. Not possibility. Not the possibility of possibility.

Majdanek- Dr. Fred Leitner, ©2012

23


Not myself. I am not sure the person I was still exists. I donʼt remember how I used to greet guests at the door, or friends in the street. Was I the jovial sort, did I tell a lot of jokes? I can no longer find my thoughts. I cannot retrieve my own secrets. I cannot recall the things I used to like, or dislike. Ice cream. Movies with sad endings. Seeing my cousins. Not seeing them.

I once used to write, but Iʼm not sure I still remember how. Write, I mean. My voice sounds like it was so long ago; I am given to s imply repeat ing, repeating, repeating. Repeating, repeating.

My feet, I canʼt find my feet. I must have left them behind on another continent. Or perhaps in another lifetime.

XIII

I can no longer be sure of the conversations I once had with God. I thought weʼd resolved them. If so, what does he want now. Does he, or does he not, want us to struggle. If so, whom does he want us to struggle with.

The enemy?

Ourselves?

Him?

XIV

Can the soul determine its own residence.

A foot of earth becomes a continent. Motion and immobility meet, and separate, and meet again, within me. If I take this step, what will happen. What kind of Self will emerge on the other side. What changes will distance – distance engaged, distance crossed, distance conquered – impose upon me.

Will my heart learn how to re-conquer itself. Are thoughts just interested bystanders, or are they precursors to a c t i o n . A r e e m o t i o n s n a t u r a l phenomena that are meant to be endured, or are they internal winds that are meant to fill internal sails.

Will I still be recognizable to light. Will the words of others still be able to find me, and leave me touched.

✡

Photos by Dr Fred Leitner were taken when he went on the March of the Living, 2012.

24


Depending on the Light We Carry to Positions for Pnina Cohen-Gagnon*

Marsha Goldberg ! I. The teacher comes out of her first floor flat awash with books,as if pushing a pebble, a river stone;she drags out the suitcase on wheels, taking inthe recycling bins, getting the key to the door,and her feet leave the entrance in breathless hasteas she looks up to a woman with an umbrella,thinks she must go back and get her own,turns and returns en route to the metro,feet paddling, nudging the book cart several meters further. II. The photographer takes no wages but asks for free transiton a steam liner, a trunk ship to Australiaon which she will generate a thousand snapshotsof the way the wake catches flotsam,churns the sea froth in broken patternsand nets the sunlight, scatters and gathers skeinsof gray and red, strands of kelp colored black in deep blue waterlike oil spattering and spilling over a trailof split and splintered shards, like wake water.

III. The teacher has a full fifteen minutes to studythirty-four desk tops turned hither and thither before class,a puzzle left by the group in the class before hers,fixing her eyes as upon river stones or waterfalls, like an acrobatsuspended athletically from a copterabout eight meters from the surface of the deepwhere she can observe surfaces in the room like wavespushed by rotor blades, recapture in the play of the mindthat hub in Pninaʼs vision with its set of radiating surfaces,in her own case unwinding, like airfoils spinning backwardsin indirect daylight, the noisy energy before the class arrives,the wake of the pool of humanity approaching.

25Harry Rajchgot ©1970


IV. Pnina has to sleep on a scaffold on the side of the tramp linerfor days, eat there, too, until exposure to sun makes herlight headed, gives her skin such a ruddy texture it peelswhile she records the play of shadowson the white bulkhead, blindingly lit and rusted over,at dusk seeming melted into charcoals and black under the clouds.The camera she holds records the “talk” printed on the retinain a sense, but in a sense the space never could talkof what the flushed face finds under her sky-whipped hairetched over the pageant of sea beds stirred with phosphorescenceas sharks slip past in the darkest hours. V. She locks the office, thirsty as usual, wheelingthe black suitcase along the curb like a little eddy, drops the keysin a pocket heading to the elevator, noticing the overhead lightlacks tubes of fluorescence, the glass vastness where potted plantsweave a tropical fringe against the setting sun beamswith a Colorado gold and a Pittsburgh red and black,hoping sheʼs done her subject and subjects justice, recallingthe brown and blue of the St. Maurice where thousands of chopped logsspin past a tent flap in the booming ground, daybreak,she remembers, being the best moment to swim.

*Pnina Cohen-Gagnon is a prolific Israeli artist. ✡


26


Where are the lights of yesteryear?

Marcel Braitstein

Where are the lights of yesteryear?

Events seemingly unforgettable

Blur

and

vanish

into

darkness

Only fragments

remain

to brighten the fog

of

memory

✡


27


In appreciation of the supporters of Harvest-Ha’Asif

David Abramson Zav LevinsonHarry Rajchgot

Vivianne Silver

David Mizrachi and Barbara Morningstar

Rabbi Lisa Grushcow’s Discretionary Fund

Illustrations and photographs: Aaron Eisenberg (Miami, USA)

Dr Fred Leitner (Toronto, Canada)

Harry Rajchgot (Montreal, Quebec)

Sophia Wolkowicz (Monteal, Quebec)U.S. National Aeronautics and Space

Administration

!

All copyrights remain the property of their authors and illustrators.

Submissions for the next edition of Harvest-Ha'Asif can be made at any time c/o the Temple office or, preferably, by e-mail to:

[email protected]

A small number of copies of earlier editions of Harvest-Ha'Asif are still available, for those who may have missed one or more. For anyone wishing to receive a copy, please contact us at the same e-mail address and we will try to fulfill your request.

The current and past issues may be found on the web at the following URL: https://sites.google.com/a/gravitationalfields.com/harvest-haasif/ and shortly as a direct link from the Temple website.

28Harry Rajchgot ©2011


mailto:[email protected]

mailto:[email protected]





Harvest-HaAsif 2012

Documents

Transcript of Harvest-HaAsif 2012