Four Leaves on the Tree of Life

Bringer of stretchers, sounder of sirens,
Warm us through our shock, hear us in silence.
Straighten our spines, believe our grief,
No matter how it knots.

What is this, holder of spaces?
Where can we stand when our floors crack with hate,
where can we sit when our chairs split from rage?
Who do we comfort when we are alone in your shul?

Scribe of knowledge, repeater of history,
Our pain is a coin, dropped from palm to palm,
a whistle from a train far away, there to remind us:
We have been here before.

Echo of shouts, Sigh of prayers,
Your voice moves through us again
We write songs that surge, we ask, we gain, we give, we ask:
Again? Yet, again? Again? Yet, again?

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